


The young Prince

by hevevols



Category: Ao no Exorcist | Blue Exorcist
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-12-28
Updated: 2017-04-19
Packaged: 2018-03-04 00:18:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 41,777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2901278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hevevols/pseuds/hevevols
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Rin was attacked at a younger age, when he couldn't fight back? When a 7 year old Rin finds himself in Gehenna, will he keep his humanity or give in to the demon inside?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A Walm Welcome

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at a fanfic, I apologize in advance for any OOC-ness or mistakes.  
> disclaimer *I do not own Ao no Exorcist, it is the property of Kazue Kato.*

Rin didn't like waiting. He wasn't impatient by nature, he just didn't like the tension. Being 7 years old didn't help his case either; as he was, full of energy and with nothing to do, Rin could only sit outside Fujimoto's study jittering nervously. He'd gotten into another fight defending Yukio, he didn't regret it but that certainly didn't mean he was looking forward to the old man's disappointment. That's why he didn't like the waiting.

"Rin, you can come in now." It was the old man, he sounded stern. At the voice, Rin jumped up and hesitantly entered the study. Inside he shuffled over to the chair situated in front of the old man's desk, his usual seat for interrogation. Fujimoto was the first to talk.

"Rin, this is your 5th fight this week, and it's only Wednesday. You can't go on like this, you need to use your head..."

"They were picking on Yukio again..." Rin muttered, the more common of his responses, Fujimoto replied with his own, the exasperated sigh. Rin didn't like that sigh either, despite his love for the old man. It was, as 7 year old Rin decided, the embodiment of disappointment.

"I know Rin, I know. But it doesn't mean you should beat them up." his was calm, tired almost, Rin would have preferred him to be angry. "You need to be more level-headed, Yukio could get into trouble if you continue..."

"I'm just trying to help!"

"Even with the right goal, using the wrong ends to get there will make it meaningless." Realizing he was talking to a usually hyper-active 7 year old, Fujimoto changed tactics "I'm proud that you're protecting Yukio, really, I am. But he won't want you getting into trouble for him, even with good intentions. Yukio doesn't like seeing you get hurt like this, none of us do. Promise me, Rin, that you'll stop fighting like this.

"But..."

"Promise me, Rin."

"OK" he muttered, put on the spot Rin didn't see another option. "I promise."

Fujimoto stood up, his serious expression melting away to reveal his signature smile.

"Come on, dinner is probably ready by now!" Stepping around his desk he offered his hand to Rin, his expression still shocked after Fujimoto's sudden change. Enticed by the offer of food and assuming he was safe after the old man's change in mood, Rin smiled brightly; taking his guardian's hand, he was led from the room.

Rin had always stayed quiet when he was being lectured, disappointing his old man was amongst the growing list of things he didn't like . But he never knew how to react other than fight, it was almost like instinct. That's why he was called a demon, even when he only fought for what he saw as right; protecting others, stopping cruelty, it didn't matter, anything that went wrong was 'the demon's' fault.

After dinner, Rin went outside, quickly finding a seat. The old man had wanted to talk to Yukio, in private. Something about the monsters Yukio was seeing. Rin didn't see them, Yukio wasn't a liar though, he could trust his twin that much. So that left him to sit outside, brooding as only a 7 year old could, by sulking. He was honestly confused, he still didn't know a way to fight except by using his fists. However hard he tried, enthusiasm could only get him so far. That's when he heard the scream. Before he could even think about what he was about to do, he was on his feet and running towards the noise. As soon as he was out through the monetary gates he heard the scream again, to the left. Turning down a nearby lane, Rin just kept running until the path opened up into a small square, a park in the middle. He heard the scream again, it was coming from the park. Rin kept running.

"Why isn't anyone else coming? Dammit." Rin burst through the bushes into a clearing, it was a woman surrounded by some men. With one last whisper and a short breath, Rin charged into battle. "Sorry, Dad." He was going to have to break his promise.

 

 

As he drew closer, the scene in front of him became clearer. The woman was bleeding, and the man in front of her holding a knife while the others pinned her down. He'd never fought a full-grown man before.

"Hey! Stop!" He yelled as he drew closer. There was a first time for everything. The man holding the knife could barely grunt in disbelief before he was punched in the only place little Rin could reach at the time, right between the legs. Even he knew the taboo of his action, but considering the situation he decided all was fair-play. The man grunted once more before falling awkwardly to the ground, wheezing.

"Son of a bi..." The rest of the words were lost to Rin as he ducked under one of the men's right swings; as he ducked he noticed the other man had released the woman to come at him as well. Rin saw her out of the corner of his eye, limping away; no back-up then. Just him and the... His train of though ended abruptly as he was hit in the face, he really didn't see that one coming. Momentarily blinded, Rin flailed out wildly earning satisfying contact and a rewarding groan. His legs were kicked from underneath him and he hit the floor, hard. Still flailing and still blind, Rin tried to get to his feet only to be pushed back down and pinned into place. His vision was starting to clear but all that occupied his mind was the guy on-top of him, he was heavier than Rin had expected. He didn't look fat when he had first seen them, barely more than a bag of bones if Rin remembered correctly... What was he made of? Metal?

When he could properly see again, he had two men on him and the ringleader in front of him, knife in hand; well, he had certainly made an impression. Pretty much the same situation as the woman. Up close, he saw the knife was stained with blood and coated with a fresher, redder layer. That's when it sunk in, these men could kill him, would kill him; all because he was an idiot. Great.

"Trying to be a hero huh? Bit young for that huh, kiddo?" Up close, the man was frightening, regardless of the crimson coated knife. He was tall with short dark hair and lean muscle. But what really disturbed Rin was the man's eyes. They seemed wrong... Inhuman, murderous, and amongst other things... Just plain crazy. "When you get too close to fire, you get burnt." That's when he kicked Rin. There was more force behind than the usual hits he took, the pain was greater too. He felt something warm running down his face and the familiar metallic taste of blood flooded into his mouth; and another burst of stars in front of his eyes. Head injuries were always the worst.

The man squatted down in front of Rin, yanking his hair to pull his head up. Rin hadn't noticed when exactly the man had changed, but when he looked up at him again he had short horns curling out from beneath his hair and a tail, thrashing around behind him; but his eyes, his eyes were still the same. He looked like a demon. A real demon. "So where do you wanna hurt first?" The man, or rather demon, brought the knife up to Rin's throat. "That punch hurt like a bitch. You're pretty strong for a kid, huh?" The... whatever he was... threw Rin's head down, it met the ground with a sickening crack.

"Hey, Hirota, he's just a kid. You might kill him, then the police would be after us for sure!" One of the goons spoke out although Rin couldn't tell which one. Well, that was comforting. Wait, didn't they see him? He was a demon! They should e panicking over the ringleader. He had demonic features and black ...things?... swarming around him, or rather behind him. That just screamed danger.

"What? Are you scared? He's just a kid" The ring leader spoke again. "Now why don't we start with the face? These kinds of wounds tend to bleed a lot don't they?" He sniggered at the sight of Rin's face; his nose was still streaming blood and there was a newer wound on his forehead, determined not to be out-competed. Wow, the crazy just kept on coming. Rin's panic did too, the knife coming closer to his face being the main cause. He screwed his eyes shut waiting for the pain, but all that came was a gentle warmth. Ok, that wasn't right. Was he dead or something? No, that wasn't right either, he heard screaming; hell then? He knew the old man lectured him a lot but this was a bit extreme for a broken promise.

Opening his eyes he discovered... blue. A pale flickering blue. Hell was blue?

"Fire? whaa..?" Rin cut off mid sentence, his revelation that the flames where coming from him, that he was on fire, was more than a little overwhelming. The goons where running away from him, leaving his limbs free; but the man... demon... seemed fixated on him. He couldn't tell if he was shocked, scared or amazed but there was a new glint to his eyes. They didn't seem murderous, crazy sure, but he seemed gleeful; that scared Rin more than murderous eyes.

"The young lord? I was told that you were alive and in Assiah... But here in front of me..." The demon-man-thing dropped into a sweeping bow. "Our father awaits us in Gehenna."

"F-father?" Rin couldn't help but stutter, it was getting too weird. What was Gehenna? Or Assiah for that matter, and what did he mean by father? The 7 year old mind could only speculate so much.

"Haven't they told you? Those damn exorcists!" Oh great, the angry was back. The man stood up now, his rage visibly rising. "Your father, our father, Lord Satan..." his last words rung in Rin's ears, paralysed from shock Rin could only continue to lie as he was. He was defenceless as the demon, now knowing it couldn't be anything else, grabbed his wrist and started leading him down various lanes and alleys. "He will be pleased, he's been searching for you for a long time..." He kept talking but all Rin could think about were the words still ringing in his head. Lord Satan.

Eventually they arrived at a wider back-ally. He was laughing manically as the ground seemed the bubble and shift; Rin initially thought it was changing in random patterns, until he saw the faces. Moaning, crying, screaming faces in hues of murky, dark purple. Containing them was what seemed to be an intricate, rectangular, stone frame rising from the floor. What the hell was it?

"The Gehenna gate... He must have got my message..." Well, his question was answered; he was probably more confused now. The demon yanked Rin forward, towards the gate. Stumbling from the sudden show of strength, he was given no choice but to fall into the gate.

 

Fujimoto relaxed into his office chair in the monastery, he had just told Yukio the truth above demons, he'd even agreed to let him train to become an exorcist.

"That kid..." he smiled, shaking his head a little, "He'd take on all the demons in the world to protect Rin..." Chuckling, Fujimoto headed outside "Speaking of the devil, where is he?" Rin usually went outside or to his room after fights, but he was no-where to be found. It was weird without him, a little to quiet, too calm; and the cooking was awful in comparison. It was pretty late to, with school tomorrow Rin should have gone to bed by now; even though he knew that bundle of energy wouldn't get to sleep till early morning.

"Hey, Rin!" he called starting to get a little worried. "Where are you?" He didn't get a reply. Not too comforting. "It's getting pretty dark outside... Rin?" This was a little far for one of his childish pranks. Fujimoto searched the grounds desperately with no sign of Rin, running back inside he found the other priests still in the kitchen. "Have any of you seen Rin?" He was greeted by the usual "not since dinner"s, the "have you checked outside?"s.

"Rin isn't anywhere, I've looked." Fujimoto was really starting to panic.

"You don't think he left the grounds do you?" Finally, Nagatomo, some useful input; sure it was voicing his fears out loud but it was proper incentive to get looking.

"Right, I'm going out to look for him. Nagatomo, Reiji, come with me; everyone else stay here with Yukio, Rin might come back and..." He left the 'It's night, there could be more sadistic demon attacks, Yukio is vulnerable too' unspoken.

Weapons concealed, the trio left the gates splitting up to cover more ground. Fujiomoto took the left. A little on he heard screaming, it sounded like men. Fully grown men. What. He ran towards the noise and found himself in a park, there was blood, singed ground and bark. What happened here, unless it was...

"Rin!" Fujimoto looked around wildly before finding footprints, two pairs, one large and one small. He was sure glad of his training then. The trail wasn't hard to follow, muddy footprints, drips of blood; whoever... Whatever this demon was, was either careless, over-excited or didn't have anyone to fear. He sincerely hoped it was the former. Even as an ex-paladin, he was getting old.

Then he came into a wider alley and he saw it, a Gehenna gate; this guy was definitely in the big leagues. Even in the dark he could see them clearly. The first one to catch his notice was a tall man, obviously possessed, with large horns, tail, swarms of coal tar. But in the Gehenna gate, was Rin. Struggling, Squirming, half of him was already in the portal but he was fighting, flailing; objectively Fujimoto was pound.

Charging in, he started chanting his mantra.

"An Exorcist? Damn it!" the demon turned around swinging a wild punch, Fujimoto dodged easily, his voice not wavering once. As he neared the end of the mantra, the demon started laughing; that was new. "It's too late now" It was practically spitting out the words "He's already gone..." Then he realised his mistake, he'd been too focused on the demon in front of him.

Once trapped in the Gehenna gate's snare, one can never escape.

Fujimoto looked over to the gate, all left showing was a little hand reaching out towards the sky, limp as it was still. He finished the mantra cutting of the demon's choking laugh. The hand was gone now but the gate was spewing low-level demon. Sentimentality would have to wait till later; he had a job to do, even with the tears blurring his vision.

 

 

It was strange to be trapped in the Gehenna gate. Some parts were cold, others warm, and it was all suffocating. Rin couldn't breathe but he didn't seem to need to. The brief time spent in the void felt like hours, trapped within a moment, Rin could understand people's fear of the unknown. But he would bet that the other people with that fear weren't stuck in some demonic gate. He was surrounded by the same hues of purple and blue as the faces he'd seen when he first came into contact with the gate, but black was starting to ebb into the edges of his vision; the instant the pressure was gone, everything in his sight faded into darkness.

 

Fujimoto was sat in his office, head in his hands. He didn't have a choice any more; the Vatican exorcists had been called in to deal with the Gehenna gate. It didn't take long for them to learn about Rin and Yukio, he'd expected them to find out at some point, but not so soon. Thankfully he was able to prove Yukio was fully human; Rin was another story. The boy was hardly 7 years old and he had barely prevented the 'kill on sight' order. They couldn't send out a search team either, who in their right minds would go to Gehenna? And how they would get there was a whole other matter. Even exorcists had their limits. He had lost a lot of trust too, having concealed Satan's children; that, at least, was expected. The Vatican was planning on moving Kurikara, to a more 'secure' location; but Fujimoto was sure they just didn't want it to be near him.

"Shiro?"

"I'm here Nagatomo."

"More paperwork... it's from the Vatican." Nagatomo sounded just as tired as Fujimoto.

"Thank you, have you seen Yukio lately?" Fujimoto tidily piled the sheets on his desk while he waited for Nagatomo's reply, the seconds dragging by was enough for him to know Yukio's condition hadn't changed.

"He's the same as before... He's in his room if you want to see him; I think he... I think he misses Rin but I just can't tell..." Fujimoto had been trying to keep his calm but the other priests weren't taking it well, Yukio wasn't taking it worse. Fujimoto couldn't tell if he was angry, sad, depressed or conflicted; he just looked... blank. If it felt like hell here, he didn't want to think about Rin's condition.

 

Even when Rin came back to consciousness, he didn't open his eyes. Something was soft, warm too. He couldn't tell what it was but it was comfortable. Maybe he was in his bed... His bed wasn't normally this comfortable though, he wasn't exactly upset with the change; just confused. He didn't remember going to bed, or much before that; maybe he had fallen asleep outside waiting or something. Compared to hard ground he supposed his bed would seem heavenly. Despite his curiosity, he couldn't bring himself to open his eyes; he knew he was pretty lazy but his was a new level altogether, even for Rin. Before he knew it, a wave of exhaustion hit him and he fell back into oblivion. During his more lucid moments, Rin wondered why no-one was waking him up. He'd been sleeping for a while, maybe he was sick; he hadn't gotten sick before so he wasn't sure but whenever Yukio was sick, he'd sleep for days.

"Young Lord..." Who would call him 'Young Lord'? It was strange, like multiple voices talking at once. "Young Lord, please. You must wake up now..." Nope, too weird. He was used to 'Hey Rin, you going to sleep forever?' or 'Rin, you're going to be late for school.' not... Formalities. Opening his eyes took more effort than normal but when he did, he definitely wasn't in his bed. Overlooking him was a... Frankly weird, man. The first thing and only thing to notice, were that the man, or thing, in front of him was made of vapour, or rather mist. With a yelp, Rin fell backwards out of his bed dragging half the sheets with him.

"Young Lord!" The creature vaulted the bed to land in front of Rin, who recoiled immediately.

"Who... who are you? Where am I?" Rin tired to sound defiant but he was pretty sure his voice sounded half terrified.

"Young Lord..." The creature keeled "I am in the service of your father, my name is Dumas. I am to be your Caretaker for the time being." Naturally. "And you my Lord, are in Gehenna." Gehenna? Where had he heard that before? Oh yeah, he was attacked and kidnapped and apparently not dreaming. "You must get dressed my Lord, to address your father." Right, his father... Wait.

"My Father?"

"Yes, Lord Satan." Of course. Of course.

Rin hadn't forgotten, but he wasn't entirely trying to remember what he'd been though either. It had all seemed so wrong and confusing at the time, he hoped he had misheard. He knew the notion was ridiculous, he had amazing hearing but he could always hope.

"My lord, do you require assistance?" The creature offered a hand out to Rin. Darting out of reach, Rin found his back against the wall.

"No! No, I'm fine! I can manage." Rin did not want that thing near him; it was to say the least, unnerving. This ...Dumas, had the shape of a man but he kept shifting, like mist or fog; in a hundred different shades of greys and whites. Not like a man at all.

"Very well, Young Lord. You can find your outfit ready by your desk." With that Dumas dissipated; the vapour that made him drifting out the room under the door. Unnerving wasn't enough to describe this any more.

With Dumas gone he had the chance to look around the room, or more appropriately, around his cell. The bed he had been on was a mess, it's scarlet covers bundled around his feet from where he fell off. But the rest of the room was ridiculously neat; a desk, chair and wardrobe in the same dark wood and a door to the left. Oh, a door.

Scrambling to his feet, Rin ran to the door after almost tripping up on the sheets he flung open the door. A bathroom, it was a bathroom. This didn't make much sense at all. The bathroom had a bath, toilet and sink but was otherwise empty. Leaving the bathroom, Rin closed the door and sat on the bed. He might have been kidnapped but that didn't mean he had to co-operate.

"I'm doomed," he whined. With all the madness around him, he needed a firm grip on reality; that meant acknowledging defying Satan in his own lair was a bad idea. The door opened, despite the fact that he was sure it led to the bathroom. It was Dumas.

"Young Lord, you haven't changed are you sure you do not require assistance."

"No, I'm not getting changed." Looking behind Dumas, Rin noticed he was standing in a hallway not the bathroom. Great, so things were going to get weirder.

"Your father..." Rin glared. "Very well then. Please, if you would follow me." Walking out past Dumas, Rin found himself in the hallway he'd seen before, it had the same somewhat Gothic theme as the room. It's walls were lined with blue fire torches and tapestries depicting morbid, gory or downright frightening images. He'd have to remember to give his compliments to his host. Dumas unnerved him, despite having no eyes Rin could feel the demons gaze from behind him; it wasn't a murderous glare, it didn't seem to carry any intent at all. It just made him feel cold inside.

Considering the way his stomach churned in fear at just being with one demon, he wasn't looking forwards to meeting Satan. It was a name everybody knew; Rin could never pay attention in class and he knew the name. Even though common sense dictated that he didn't exist and he certainly wasn't his father; it also dictated that demons didn't exist and you couldn't be teleported to other worlds. Trapped in existential thoughts way beyond himself, Rin didn't notice he stopped walking; he did notice however the cold pressure on his shoulder. It wasn't quite a hand, it lacked... Presence. It was Dumas. Well, he definitely wasn't regretting refusing 'assistance'.

"My Lord, you must keep walking, there is nowhere else to go. You can't escape, your father has spent a long time looking for you; he won't let go of you easily. Now, will you come with me, young Lord?" The voices sounded sickly polite as Dumas lifted one arm, as if to signal 'march'. As he continued to trudge through the corridor his attention kept drifting to the tapestries; a battle of men and creatures, demons? Another of a funeral, a more traditional hunt scene, a rather graphic goat being dismembered... Time to stop looking at the tapestries.

The corridor opened into a grand hall with multiple other corridors leading away on two levels; it was called grand for a reason. But at the end were two large doors, tall enough to scale both floors whilst ornate as well; images of angels and demons, beautiful landscapes, barren wastelands and blazing infernos. The doors slowly swung open to reveal a room larger than the hall but dimly lit with only a few of the blue torches. In an instant it changed, lines of fire igniting either side while the torches flared with more igniting to have brighter flames. It was like a court or an amphitheatre with high seating on the sides and a throne ahead of him; it was still in darkness, as if the light refused to penetrate the shadows. A deep, rumbling laugh echoed from the far end.

"Welcome home..." He heard ruffling of fabrics before heavy footsteps, growing louder. A man emerged from the shadows, he had long white hair with two small flaming horns and elongated ears, he wore a long black, elegant jacket and black trousers. From a distance, he could have passed as human but there was something fundamentally wrong about him, something that screamed inhuman; and it terrified Rin. "I hope you've had a warm reception, Son."


	2. Field Trip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the positive feedback!

Rin was paralysed. He couldn't speak, couldn't move, he could only stare at the man in front of him, the man he could only assume, was Satan. His smile was manic as he stood at the edge of the platform, after pausing momentarily he continued down the steps towards Rin.

"Are you scared?" he tutted, chuckling lightly; but the pleasant façade fell away quickly to reveal a more serious expression. "Demons aren't meant to get scared." What did he mean, calling him a demon? It had become his nickname after all of his fights but... He wasn't actually demon. They kept calling Satan his father even though he was human, they couldn't mean he was... Rin didn't have any more time to think, Satan had started to walk towards him with the same heavy footsteps. Rin tried to step backwards but he still couldn't make his limbs move, all he could do was watch as the demon grew closer. Satan moved to be almost parallel to his side, placing one hand on his shoulder. "Then again, you were raised by humans; they made you look like one too..."

"Wha-What do you mean?" Rin had already figured it out, he was just clinging to the hope that he was wrong. After all, he was never right, just this once he wouldn't mind being wrong. His spirits plummeted as he caught Satan smirk.

"You've already figured it out, haven't you?" he bent down a little and lowered his voice to a whisper,. "you're a demon." Smiling cruelly as Rin's expression of shock intensified, he straightened up moving his hand from Rin's shoulder to his head, forcefully turning it to face him. His eyes were electric blue like Rin's own but his pupils were blood red and cold like his never were. They seemed to shift and burn like the blue fire in the torches as Satan examined him. "You're still wearing human clothes too, attached are we? They sealed you, lied to you, millions would happily kill and torture you... Yet you still cling to humans." His manic smile returned. "We can always change that, you're still young. Make no mistake you will awaken, you already have some of your flames..." He released Rin's head and turned around walking back to his throne. "Get the sword, I don't care you does it, they can even take him if they want. Bring it back to me, even if you open Kurikara I doubt you'll be able to break it. He turned and sat down, relaxing languidly on his throne. "We'll meet again when you've awakened. Get this imitation out of my sight."

Afterwards, Rin was forcefully dragged from the amphitheatre, he was willing enough to leave but still found himself incapable of movement. Rin didn't know if he had been frozen from fear, from shock, or from an understandable mixture of both. He had dealt with a lot in his small life but being kidnapped by demons, finding out you're actually a demon and then that your father is actually the dark overlord of hell... Was more than a little overwhelming for a 7 year old. Back in his quarters he collapsed onto his bed it's covers having been remade; he wanted to cry, to scream but he was meant to be the strong one, he felt so selfish, guilty and conflicted. He had barely put any thought to the others at the monastery; he had been told every one had been lying to him but surely they loved him, they were his family. He had loved them, sure he felt like he didn't quite fit in, like he was different; then again, he guessed that had been explained now... He wanted to back home, to the monastery; to see everyone again and ask them himself. He'd do whatever it took to get back, even if that meant crawling out of hell himself.

* * *

"Can't you do anything?" Rin had been gone for a week now, but Fujimoto hadn't given up hope much to the aggravation of Mephisto.

"You're asking for the impossible, Shiro." Mephisto locked his hands together on his desk in preparation for Fujimoto's next barrage. He was acting like he'd really lost a son, he wasn't entirely sure how to deal with this side of him. Satan had played his hand earlier than he had expected, he had so many plans and almost all of them were now rendered null. He hadn't even been expecting the flames to emerge until the kid was 15, let alone 7 years old.

"You've got connections haven't you? You have to know something..."

"By now he's in Satan's clutches, I know _that_ for certain." How was he supposed to work under these conditions? Mephisto didn't feel like his usual self, pressure from the Vatican, pressure from Fujimoto and the addition of ruined plans could do that. Rin could have been a useful addition to the Vatican's arsenal for the upcoming war, another pawn for him to utilize but no, the Vatican had ordered a 'capture or kill' warrant which was sure to lose his interests in the proposal.

"But if you want my advice, keep your eyes on Kurikara." When Mephisto's trademark smile came up in this situation, Fujimoto knew something was wrong. If someone drew Kurikara then Rin would awaken, if not fully; was that the next move? If Rin awakened, the Vatican would kill on site. Dammit, why wasn't Mephisto ever straightforward? He jammed his key for headquarters into the office door on his way out, he didn't have time for courtesy, he had his son to protect.

Walking through the main desks he listened out for any sign of Rin.

"Unusually low demon attacks across..." Nope. "No sign of suspect in area 13... None in 9 or 20 either, 4 still to report..." And nope again. This was ridiculous. He could only hope ex-paladin status would grant him an unscheduled meeting...

* * *

No-one seemed to quite know what to do in Gehenna. Every demon wanted to earn favour with Satan but fewer were willing to break and enter their enemies' headquarters. The 6 remaining princes in Gehenna were getting the worst of it. If one succeeded, the others would face disappointment worthy of complete humiliation but if they failed they'd face worse by their father and pain from the escape. Amaimon was tempted, he was one of the youngest princes sure but he wanted to meet his new 'little brother' and he'd have the opportunity to visit his older brother. Any of the princes had the ability, the motivation was also there; inclination was a little harder, in the simpler sense most were too comfortable to leave. Amaimon found it funny that the two eldest, most powerful and most capable were already in Assiah but too busy to consider doing the job, also he doubted Mephisto would touch an order from their father with a long stick. Yeah, maybe he would do it, he missed Assiah's sweets; all he had to do was find Rin's room.

Rin wanted to count the days he'd been stuck in his overly comfortable prison, but he found that a little hard to do in a room with no windows. At some point his clothes had been changed, he hoped it wasn't Dumas. The jacket could have been from the military, black and smart looking with a gold trim, not just on the edges but in loops around the buttons and cuffs too; his trousers were also black, and his shoes, Rin was starting to see a running theme in demons' choice of clothes. He could start scratching lines into the wall every time he slept but he didn't have anything to scratch them with and his fingernails weren't all that sharp. Huffing, Rin stood at the end of his bed and let himself fall forward; hell was unexpectedly boring.

"So you're Rin..." _What?_ Rin scrambled up, it was coming from the headboard; when he looked behind him he found a man, and a pretty strangely dressed one at that. A long dark brown coat with a tattered tail, some kind of cream waistcoat with a yellow striped tie, puffy dark brown trousers with white spots and shoes in the same colour with strange skull buckles... seriously who was this guy, Rin wouldn't even get started on the man's hair. He looked kind of cool but Rin would never admit that on principle, he didn't admit things to people who didn't knock. "I guess you're my little brother," What? The man cocked his head at Rin. "Heard you were pretty interesting. Wanna go on a field trip?"

Rin just stared at the man. Was this a trick or something? Only one way to find out.

"Who are you?" He had to have been a demon, generally they seemed to be the sole inhabitants of this place but he had called him his brother. If the man had any sort of reaction, he didn't show it.

"I'm your big brother, I thought that had already been implied." Oh, so Rin did hear right. "I've never had a little brother before, this could be a fun," he looked over to the door, "we can't just stroll out the front door with you looking so... human. Might be useful when we get to Assiah, you blended in pretty well before." He man jumped from the headboard landing lightly beside the bed, he grabbed Rin's arm and dragged him off the bed and out the door with the same emotionless expression.

At least he was consistent.

He took Rin the opposite direction to Dumas' last visit, he wouldn't miss another trip to Satan. All the corridors looked the same, maybe it was designed this way to make it harder to escape or you know, to make it's 'guests' go insane; or this guy way just taking him where other demons wouldn't be... Nah, it was definitely to make him go insane. As they progressed, the tapestries just seemed to get progressively more graphic and more twisted, they were practically encouraging insanity. On the other hand, it was possible that the residents just liked to be sadistic; they were demons after all. Thinking about it properly, it was probably a combination of both factors.

The man abruptly stopped causing Rin, propelled by his own momentum, to crash into him. "Oh yeah, I didn't tell you my name, did I? I'm Amaimon, king of the Earth." With that he stepped into the wall, dragging Rin after him and despite common sense the wall just seemed to swallow them up. Actually considering his situation, common sense had gone out the window a while ago. "Try not to let go." Despite himself, Rin clung onto Amaimon, he wasn't used to being inside walls but even with his inexperience he could tell they were moving upwards. The stone dug into his back and he couldn't see the slightest thing in front of him but at least he knew their destination, they were going back to Earth. Maybe his chance to escape would be sooner than he'd thought; demon or not he was getting home.

After a few minutes they came to a room, empty save for the Gehenna gate. Amaimon supposed this would work, assuming his little brother wouldn't make a mess of things. He looked down at Rin, still holding his arm. Maybe he needed to say something.

"Are you ready?" Of course, the perfect thing to say to a freaked out small child. Rin just looked kind of irritated and confused, possibly determined; Amaimon hadn't quite adapted for reading emotions, or showing emotions... It was generally a grey area. With that thought, he led Rin into gate.

The passage seemed faster than last time, closer to half an hour than days; he didn't even black out. Then there was light; it was actually a little blinding. When his vision returned, Rin found himself in a street; a normal, if slightly dirty, street. He was quite frankly delighted. At his first opportunity he'd escape but the grip on his arm was relentless, he'd have to wait a little longer. That was fine, he might tear out his hair but he was fine.

Rin seemed to be looking around a little frantically; maybe Amaimon should say something again. There should be a guide for interacting with humans, his older brother managed pretty well; maybe he could ask for tips. He wasn't planning to make human interaction frequent, but it wasn't easy when you finally get a younger brother only to not know what to do with them. How often do you feed them? What do you do with them when you want to do other things? He should have first hand experience but he just kind of did things, on top of that it had been over 1,000 years and family relationships were a little... non-existent, or at least hard to come by.

"Come on." Next stop, Vatican headquarters. Walking down the streets the casual observer, were the pair visible to them, would see a rather dysfunctional looking family. Both strangely dressed individuals; one wearing a deadpan expression the other being dragged behind with a mixture of reluctance, annoyance and excitement.

Rin could have collapsed by the time they reached their destination, when his opportunity to escape came he'd probably just keel over. The only motivation left to him was seeing his family; Yukio, the old man and all the other monks just once more. Then the pressure was gone from his arm as Amaimon decided to speak.

"You'll have to be qu-" Rin was already running.

* * *

 

Fujimoto had already started Yukio's training, even in Rin's absence Yukio had been pretty adamant to progress as soon as possible. The kid just wanted to be strong enough to get his big brother back, there was nothing wrong with that. But his newfound fixation on demons that was the problem. At first, they had been the monsters in the dark, then the very real terrors that took his twin away from him. Yukio had started to hate them, not the usual want found amongst exorcists to protect the living. He was constantly edging closer to the desire for revenge; especially fixating on Satan. He wouldn't have been the first, especially after the blue night but it wasn't what he had wanted for Yukio.

"I'm going to get them." There was a quiet voice behind him.

"Yukio?"

"The demons, Satan."

"Yukio." Fujimoto couldn't keep the concern out of his voice.

"I'm going to kill them, all of them." Fujimoto turned around to Yukio, kneeling down. If there was any time to try and fix this, it was now or never.

"I know, Yuki-" It was hushed but he still heard the small hitch of breath coming from the doorway. He whipped around to see the small face behind the ajar door. "Rin?" The hair, the eyes... It was Rin. Yukio turned around then, just in time to see his brother bolt.

He was running again, first from Amaimon now from Yukio and the old man. He wanted to _kill_ all demons, didn't they know Rin was a demon? Did they want him dead?

_'They sealed you, lied to you, millions would happily kill and torture you...'_

No. He did not need Satan's words in his head right now. But why else would they be here? He'd been told this was exorcist headquarters, they hunted demons. Had they really been lying to him? Was everyone at the Monastery in on this? He had to stop thinking about this, it was hurting his head. All he had to do was run and just keep running. He turned the corner to find a barricade of people wearing dark coats, carrying guns, swords and books but at the front of the formation was a surprisingly gaudy man carrying a pink umbrella.

"Hello there." The man smiled brightly. "We're here to detain you; you're lucky you're still human..."the man's smile faltered. Rin had burst into flames. Blue flames.

* * *

There seemed to be a commotion, all the exorcists were running around. If Amaimon had to guess, he'd assume it was because of Rin. It hadn't been 5 minutes yet, he would have thought the kid could have at least lasted that long. But that helplessness, he supposed, was why little brothers needed older brothers; when they were little, they were hopeless. He hoped he hadn't been that bad as a kid.

As he made his way down a corridor he sensed Rin over to his right even though the exorcists were running in the opposite direction. Maybe he had lost them; running for one's life probably allowed one to do crazy things, Rin had already seemed pretty crazy and his senses had never lied to him before... To the right then. Two exorcists were standing guard outside a door, Rin had to be on the other side. A quick chop to the neck and the first one was down, the second one whipped round pulling out a gun. Amiamon stamped his foot on the ground and a pillar of earth pinned the other to the wall, the impact knocking him unconscious. At least Rin's distraction made it easier for him. Kicking open the doors he strolled in.

"Rin?" He shouted "You can stop hiding now." Looking around, Amiamon noted that there were next to no places to hide. Rin's aura was coming from a podium in the centre, behind it then; he checked. Nothing. Then it was coming behind him, there had been nothing there but the... Of course, the sword. "Kurikara, is it?" he addressed the inanimate object, formalities first of course; even if he never used them anywhere else. He grabbed the case in one hand, the hilt in the other; he'd been told unsheathing the sword would cause Rin to awaken as his true demon self. If his little brother was surrounded by exorcists, he'd need every advantage in that fight and he needed to know where his loyalties should lie. "Time to wake up, Rin." Drawing the sword, it burst into blue flames, magnificent and reminiscent of those of their father. No wonder Satan had wanted him but now he'd just have to finish his mission, he just needed to get Rin back home.

* * *

It hurt. It hurt beyond any description. Like his bones were splintering, his head about to burst, his skin blistering under searing heat and all that blue light. The same as in the park but that light had been warm, there the fire didn't hurt him. It hurt him now. His thoughts were incoherent, a cacophony of screams and a torrent of emotions. All he could think about, all he could really think about was the pain and the blue. Ahead of him was an abyss and he was falling. Falling into the darkness.

Fujimoto turned the corner to see Rin crumple, shrouded by flames. The same flames from the blue night, Satan's flames. "Rin..." His voice was hoarse and came in barely whisper. Rin had awakened. He had vowed to himself to protect him, to keep him human but after everything he had done... Rin had still awakened. He thought they could have had more time, that he could have kept him safe at the Monastery. His son was on the floor clutching his head and screaming and there was nothing he could do. He couldn't even reach out, the flames kept everyone at bay; he could feel the heat from meters away. In another situation he would have prized the look of surprise on Mephisto's face. In another situation his sons would be safe.

He felt Yukio at his side, clutching at his coat as Fujimoto tried and failed to shield him from the sight in front of him. He shouldn't have had to see this, they shouldn't have had to have this life. It was more frightening when Rin fell still, the hallway now silent. Before he could reach him, the exorcists swarmed in.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if I went a bit OOC, this chapter may have been a little short but I'll update again soon.


	3. The Calvary

Amaimon had, in short, messed up. He thought he'd disabled the majority of the wards in this section but there'd been a trap, slow acting but potent and it had been set around the sword. It was even affecting him so it had to be high level, and if he couldn't escape it then Rin definitely couldn't either. Targeting any demon in the vicinity, he was powerful enough not to feel it's effects until then without any counter but Rin had just awakened; his little brother had the flames but he wouldn't be able to escape it's effects. Quickly sheathing Kurikara, Amiamon burst back through the doors. Cancelling out the sword's presence he could sense a fainter aura in the opposite direction. He'd just have save Rin the old fashioned way.

Mephisto considered the recently occurring events. Firstly, he had two little brothers running amok; secondly, the elder of his little brothers had almost just certainly unsealed the younger and thirdly, the earlier mentioned little brother was writhing in pain and blue flames on the floor in front of him. He didn't like it when real life events opposed his plans for them, he'd have to update his records; Amaimon had gotten better at disabling wards. With the flames shrouding him, none of the exorcists could get close and any argument in his defence would be forgotten, there were few that didn't remember the blue night with less than fond memories. Even though his hands were covering his face, it was clear he was a demon. Elongated ears, the sharp, prominent canines and of course the 'oh so obvious' horn-like flames and tail. He was too caught up in his thoughts to avoid the look of shock that crossed his face, he absently noticed Shiro turn the corner, it was a good thing there was a better distraction or he'd never have lived it down. He briefly wondered if he had known about the ward causing Rin's reaction, he had been excluded from recent plans and all having left the paladin post; if he did it'd probably force him to accept Rin's change. Or maybe he had realised that the flames were too powerful for Rin's body at his 'fragile' age and were tearing him apart having been released at full force. Either way, he'd probably realise his foster son was in danger. When the blue flames flickered out, that danger increased ten-fold.

"Eins, zwei, drei." With a flourish of his umbrella, Mephisto summoned his strongest prison. Before any of the exorcists even reached Rin, the gates had closed and vanished. They'd have torn him apart, he didn't have any loyally to his father and as much as he'd have loved to mess up his plans he wasn't willing to let an innocent kid get brutally slaughtered for it, especially considering he was his younger brother. Of course, these thoughts would never be voiced but they existed. He could also say it was a part of some plan if he somehow leaked them. Putting emotion aside, he needed to get the kid to a holding cell, demons proved to have short recovery times.

The boy woke up to darkness. The boy was  _quite_  not Rin. He had the same hair, same eyes, same face, same body but none of the memories. He may have not been Rin but he was confused. His eyes quickly adjusted to the lack of light, looking around his confusion grew. The room had no windows but a large iron door; he propped himself up on his elbows, he was some kind of mattress with simplistic white covers and a pillow. What did you know, there _was_ a silver lining.

With the material for positive thoughts spent he was left with questions. Firstly, he 'who was he?', he decided that was important. Secondly, it was a tie between 'where was he?' and 'why did he have a tail?'. People didn't have tails... Or maybe he always did; that's why he needed the first question's answer. Thirdly, 'why was he here?'.

"Hello?" Briefly, he criticised himself for the how idiotic he sounded, that question hadn't even made the top three. His voice was quiet and hoarse, he didn't like that so he tried again. "Hello?" A little more forceful the second time, that was a good start. Being assertive was probably helpful in re-asserting one's identity. He climbed off the mattress and padded to the door; he tried opening it, no? He tried rattling it, still no. It's clanging seemed so obtrusively loud in the silence, someone would probably hear. Was that good or bad? He put his back against the wall and let himself slide down, now to wait.

He'd waited like, an hour. Wasn't anyone coming? "HELLO?" He stood up ad started pounding on the iron door. "ISN'T THERE ANYONE? PLEASE.... please..." The silence was answer enough. He kept banging and screaming until his fist was bruised and his voice hoarse. No-one was coming. He slunk back to the mattress and crawled under the covers, they were stiff and thin but at least they weren't itchy; soon enough, he'd drifted to sleep.

It didn't last, the sound of metal clanking echoed around the small room was enough to wake anyone up. The door had only opened the width of a crack before the light became blinding, he shielded his eyes and a attempted to see beyond the light.

"Rin?" A man's voice, his eyes readjusted to show an old man standing in the doorway. Rin? Was that his name? Rin? Who was this man? "Rin?" The man stepped towards him. There was a flash before his eyes and the world seemed to disappear.

_He was looking out from behind large wooden doors, there was and an old man, the same one in his room, and a young boy._

_"I'm going to get them."_

_"Yukio?"_

_"The demons, Satan."_

_"Yukio."_

_"I'm going to kill them, all of them."_

_"I know, Yuki"_

_There was a small gasp, it must have been him. They both looked over and he ran._

He blinked and found himself back in the room, the man gripping his shoulders. His head was pounding and he felt dizzy, practically nauseous.

"Rin? Rin! Look at me!" He didn't know how he knew but he knew they were talking about him. They were talking about killing him.

"Get away from me!" The boy threw himself away from the man, felling the wall pressing against his back he jumped of the mattress and assumed a defensive position, it felt familiar somehow...

"Rin..." The man reached out again.

"Go away! Don't come near me!" He hit away the man's hand, hoping the desperation in his voice wasn't too obvious.  

 

Rin's eyes were different. They felt more like those of a stranger to Fujimoto, they were fearful and seemed to recognize him but not fully. Mephisto had filled him in after they had recovered Rin, about the possibilities of after effects. The pain he had been forced to endure was extreme beyond any limits, it could leave lasting mental or physical damage and most likely emotional damage; in such situations memory loss was common, in an attempt to forget the pain the person would suppress memories. Rin didn't seem to have many memories left. He wanted to help his son, or at least try; even lacking any blood relations he'd never see Rin another way. He'd have to try again, maybe bring some food, he probably hadn't eaten for a while.

"I'll be back, I'll try to bring some food, okay?" The fear hadn't left his eyes and the distrust was evident. He turned and walked away. He'd find a way to get Rin's memories back but in the meantime, this was the best he could do.

It wasn't long for the door to open again, his eyes had just readjusted and everything. Shielding his eyes once more he saw a strangely dressed man with green hair standing in the frame, different from the one before.

"Rin?" The man stepped closer. "The calvary has arrived."

Amaimon strode into the room, he suppose he had taken longer than he'd expected. They'd posted more guards this time, he had spent a while trying to be more careful, then he had stopped because it was taking to long and had started taking out everyone in his way. It had been pretty high security for a 7 year old; they feared him more than was reasonable but then again, his flames were no joke, the genuine blue article. He lacked control and was uninclined to violence; all they did was reinforce his insecurities over humans. He could tell he'd awakened, the tail was a bit of a giveaway, he hadn't tucked it in but then again he hadn't been taught too. Rin still hadn't moved, as if transfixed. His arm still infront of his face and his expression blank. Something was wrong. "Rin?"

_Who was he? Was this man here to help? Or was he the same as the last one?_  Rin had far too many questions, too many for his own mind to keep up with. But there was no time better to start asking them than the present.

"Who are you?"

The question hung in the air, didn't Rin remember? More introductions he guessed.

"I'm Amaimon." He stepped closer. "Your older brother." It seemed to register on Rin's face but there was no recognition for his name. That stung. "You've been kidnapped by humans, I'm here to take you home." Rin slowly lowered his arm, he was still cautious but considering he didn't seem to remember anything that was to be expected. He held out his hand to his little brother. "Are you ready?" Maybe he should smile, he was a little out of practice though, he'd probably end up looking stranger. Rin stood up and took his hand, allowing himself to be led out the door and into the light.

* * *

The first 7 years of his life were missing. Any memories he had left from that time were fragmented, distorted and frankly terrifying. He remembered overwhelming pain, the sense of suffocation and paralysis, of being trapped, but worst of all were the flashes. Hateful glares behind a shield of flickering blue and a man and boy, the same man that had come into his cell, talking about killing all demons. They seemed important but he couldn't place it, the same way he knew he was a demon before the facts confirmation; like his instinct calling out to him. They had to have been important in the past, he decided otherwise it wouldn't hurt so much when he recalled the scene, he wouldn't feel like he'd been betrayed.

The man he was with felt familiar, trustworthy even, his instinct again? He'd said he was his brother, that his name was Amaimon; he'd also told him that his own name was Rin, that's what the man had called too. All he knew for certain was that this man had saved him, and that he too was a demon. Amaimon seemed a little awkward and somewhat detached from his emotions but Rin felt a connection. As they ran down the seemingly endless corridors, Rin found himself so ensnared by his own thoughts he didn't notice the black ebbing at his vision until he collapsed.

Amaimon's first clue that something was wrong was when the small person in his grasp became dead weight, the second was the loud thud behind him.

"Ah," Amaimon spun on his heel to see Rin in a little heap; bending down, he scooped up Rin and in one smooth movement proceeded his running. "Guess you haven't recovered yet, it must have been pretty bad, huh?" He didn't need a reply, usually fainting from exhaustion spoke for itself. "Seems you're pretty stubborn though, next time just say something."

It wasn't long before Amaimon reached the surface, with a mixture of stealth and unrestrained violence it apparently wasn't so hard to escape Vatican headquarters when half the staff still thought they had caught the only infiltrator. After that it was only a matter of minutes for him to reach a secure location, contact a minor demon, send a message to his father and jump into a Gehenna gate back home. Overall, he thought his field trip was a success. Maybe they could come back over to Assiah sometime, get ice cream or something; that'd be nice.

 

When Rin woke up his first thoughts were that he was on something incredibly comfy, his second thought was one of incredible Deja vu.

"Young lord, you have an appointment with your father." Rin looked over to the voice, it could only have been a demon; not many men were vague figures formed of ever-shifting mists. "You must get ready else you'll be late." Rin didn't know if this was normal for him or not; for now, he'd just go along with it.

"Erm... Right." Clumsily rubbing his eyes, Rin inched his way to the edge of the bed. It was a little disorientating, this guy had been calling him a lord and everything and then he was talking about his father... He needed to get some facts straight. "Sorry but what's your..." He sincerely hoped he wouldn't sound too stupid. "What's your name?"

"Young Lord?" It had been confirmed, he had sounded stupid. "My name is Dumas. My lord, are you quite alright?"

"Dumas, I can take over from here." Oh hey, it was his brother.

"Amaimon!" Rin found himself unable to hold back his smile, grinning like an idiot he leaned forward. He couldn't really describe the feeling, he just felt happy to have family near, instinct again? At any rate there was a connection.

"Of course, My lord" Dumas dissipated, the mists escaping the room. Amaimon didn't pay any attention to it, he was too distracted by Rin, how was it physically possible to be so cute? He was smiling brightly, even after considerably traumatic experiences it was almost blinding. Having a little brother was going to be great.

It was a little strange how Rin's attitude had changed, before he had been scared of other demons and resentful of orders. Amaimon couldn't tell if it was because he had lost his memory or because he had awakened, maybe a mixture of both. If his mind had ceased to be clouded by delusions and memories of the past, Rin's instinct would probably feature more prominently in his actions. Despite half of the propaganda about demons, they were pretty instinctual, you could say family driven. Of course, Mephisto was an exception and Satan was bad at showing affection, which was probably the understatement of the year; Amaimon was hard pressed to think of incidences his father made such a mistake. Then again, he'd only been alive a little over 1,000 years; maybe he could ask Lucifer but he was pretty sure the eldest of his brothers was in Assiah right now. He could save that for the next field trip.

Clearing his head, Amaimon moved over to Rin. Their father wouldn't be in the best of moods if they were late. Despite the lack of need, he stuck with Rin as he got ready; sitting in quiet amusement as his little brother got flustered and helping him smooth and straighten his outfit after he messed it up. Having a little brother _was_ great.

Rin walked down the corridors next to his brother, glaze drifting from the blue torches to the morbid tapestries and back again. Rin idly wondered what his father would be like. He considered asking but he'd enough stupid had passed his mouth for day; he'd just leave it to be a pleasant surprise. Eventually they arrived at two large doors, Rin couldn't help but feel insignificant in their presence. One day he'd have to just sit in front of them and study them for a few minutes, or hours, maybe make a few sketches... First, the task on hand, the doors were opening. He had to make an effort to stop his mouth from hanging open, screw hours, days would be more fitting. It was hard not to look up as he walked through them, he'd get another chance, he did live h... he was pretty sure he lived here.

As they continued down, Amaimon veered off, patting Rin on the shoulder reassuringly; as he walked, blue torch after blue torch blazed beside him. As the room lit up, Rin noticed he was approaching a platform. He wasn't expecting the blue flames to flare up in front of him, his surprise stopped him dead in his tracks. The fire formed two lines, one only a few feet away, the other further back illuminating a throne as magnificent as the doors before and a figure that seemed to suit the features perfectly.

"Rin!" The man stood up throwing his arms open, practically beaming down at Rin; he started to descend from the platform. "I've been informed of your circumstances." His face dropped. "You've lost your memories at the hands of humans. Humans took you, humans hurt you and these humans will not be forgiven." Satan had reached the bottom of the stairs, the flames parting for him as he drew closer. "As your father, I will guarantee your safety in Gehenna but to ensure your safety you will need training." He bent down, placing his hand on Rin's shoulder. "I can teach you, how to fight, how to use your flames." He was on eye level now. " Are you prepared to learn, Rin?" Rin did want to learn more about himself, he wanted to learn about these flames, the ones that had protected him from those men. He also wanted to stop feeling the fear he carried from that cell, he wanted to continue feeling this sense of belonging he felt had been missing. Rin wanted a lot of things. He knew he could have been acting selfishly but there was only one answer he could give.

"Yes." Satan smiled at him, standing up again he climbed the steps back up to his throne, turning around once he had reached the higher ground. "I can understand form your brother that you have been through a lot, much of which many would consider traumatic. You need rest before anything but it had been two days since you came back form Assiah, if you follow Amaimon I'm sure he'll find someone to make you something to eat. If you have any questions about your past I'd advise they wait until you have fully healed. For now, I am glad to have you back, my son." 

"T-Thank you!" His father was a little intimidating but he seemed kind enough. Rin made a somewhat clumsy but adequate bow assuming he had been dismissed and walked back to the doors. Now that he thought about it, he was feeling pretty hungry, practically starving. He had been out for two days though, that meant he had two days' worth of food to catch up with, he couldn't wait. Had Rin had turned around to look at his father once more, he wouldn't have missed his smirk of triumph or the calculating look in his father's eye. Had he not been so young... No, had he not been dealing with the King of Gehenna, of hell, then he might have stood a chance.

* * *

It had been 9 years. 9 years since Rin had gone missing. Had been taken. The last time Fujimoto had seen him he had been cowering in a cell and now, now he was in Gehenna. Shiro didn't want to think about what was happening to Rin, what had happened and what he has become now. Maybe it was parental concern, maybe it was guilt but he couldn't help thinking of the Rin he had seen then and the Rin he had known before. In the end, he hadn't re-joined the order. He'd only been working with them in order to save Rin and by now they had classified him as a lost cause. Yukio seemed to be of the same opinion. He'd joined the order, youngest ever to become an exorcist; now 16, he had reached middle class and was well on his way to a promotion. He'd stopped talking about Rin, scowled at the very mention of his name. In the beginning, he'd only talk about saving his twin, then he'd only talk about resealing him, of changing him back, and after that. After that he'd only ask about how to take down high level demons. He'd given up on his brother.

 

 

Rin had changed. He still couldn't remember what had come before, before his brother found him. He'd been told about his childhood but no memories had resurfaced, he'd gotten some new ones though. Over the last 9 years he'd learned a lot.

His strength had grown exponentially, he'd gotten pretty good at controlling his flames under the tutelage of his father;  and he'd also trained with Kurikara. With or without a weapon he' had become deadly. Of course, his other teachers wouldn't be entirely satisfied with a solely physically based education. He'd spent years learning demonology, mythology, herbology, psychology and given a basic human understanding with fundamental sciences, maths, languages and history and to top it all off, etiquette. Naturally he also learnt strategy but it was one of the few theological activities he actually enjoyed; in fact, he exceled in it. It led demons to say he was born for the battle field, he kind of liked that. He reckoned his mentality had also changed. He no longer had qualms about killing, it seemed almost natural but his slightly warped morals aside his personality hadn't changed since he remembered. Although that wasn't really saying much. Then again, he could recover some of his memories soon, he had a mission to go to Assiah; it was low level of course, gathering Intel. He did need the experience so it made sense to go and it was a good excuse to fill in some blanks. Apparently the humans are preparing to launch a mass-attack on Gehenna, one of his own kind had died for this information. It was a stupid move really but Rin respected his decision to do what he wanted with his life. He hoped he didn't do anything as ridiculous as dying on his first trip. It was strange though, his father had summoned him. He wasn't exactly expecting a pep talk before he left or anything but then again, he didn't really know what to expect; this sort of thing didn't happen that often.

He'd gotten himself ready and left his quarters out into the corridors that were now so familiar; then again, half of Gehenna was now familiar. Walking towards the grand hall, Rin casually looked at the tapestries along the wall, they'd grown on him. Especially the horse tapestry. It was his favourite. He'd left with plenty of time so he stopped for a few moments to study it. After the grand doors it was his next stop. It depicted a beautiful horse by a lake but it's reflection showed a monster, next to the horse stood a boy reaching out to stroke the creature, utterly unaware of it's true nature. It was meant to show the story of the Kelpie, or at least one of them. He had found most of the tapestries were actually related to demons, the rest were there for their gore. Amaimon had once told him the story of the kelpie.

One of the oldest and most dangerous water spirits it lurks in the deepest waters during the day but as dusk approaches it rises to the surface. When the sun sets the Kelpie emerges in the shape of a large black horse, and begins searching the land for lone wanderers. **  
**When you encounter a Kelpie you've got to keep your eyes on the ground and run away. If you give in to curiosity and look directly at the Kelpie, then you will be spellbound and climb onto the demon's back.  
The Kelpie will then turn and gallop back into the loch with its prey, to devour them in the murky depths.

Ok, maybe more than once. But it was an interesting tale, if he was correct it took place in Scotland; he'd have to pay a visit, he'd wanted to meet one for a while.

Soon he'd reached the doors, he didn't need to stop, they opened before him. It was a nice feeling. Walking into the room, the torches blazed as he walked past them as the always did but he could already hear approaching footsteps.

"Your first mission in Assiah. I assume you remember your briefing." Rin stopped at a polite distance and bowed.

"Of course, father."

"Confident too? I suppose that's not a bad attribute. After all, you shouldn't even need to use your flames with a mission like this." Satan stopped at the edge of the platform, looking down at Rin. "Although I'd assume you didn't expect me to call you here for that..." Here it comes. "You should know your older brother, he goes by the name Mephisto... If you should encounter him, he'll know who you are and at your current level, he could have the power to detain you. You would do well to avoid him. Other exorcists too could remember your face. Remember Rin, this is a mission for stealth. detection could mean worse than imprisonment."

"Yes, father."

"Good. You are dismissed."

Rin bowed again and walked back out. What did you know, he got a pep talk after all.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter to make up for the shorter one earlier, sorry for any mistakes.


	4. Of Assiah and Ice cream

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Finish your current fics!" I interally scream at myself whilst plotting and imaging new stories... Somehow I actually wrote another chapter, enjoy!

Travelling through the Gehenna gate had become easier and easier for Rin, there was practically no motion sickness any more. _Practically._ Finding himself in a narrow alley, Rin ignored logic to give himself a few seconds to lean against a wall.

"One day," He vowed. "I'll get used it... Then I can go anytime I want." Groaning, he pushed away from the wall, Despite this being his first mission in  Assiah, Rin had visited a couple of times before with Amaimon. The ice cream was lovely. It did feel a little funny though, with it being official and all; maybe he could restore normality a bit, get some ice cream on the way back. He might have been ashamed of his lack of concentration was he not preoccupied with thoughts of fun and ice cream. Continuing happy thoughts, Rin sauntered into the main street. He was pretty sure he blended in pretty well, he'd changed into human clothes before he left and tucked in his tail, he even had a bag packed with more; on top of that, when he wasn't using his flames his demon features appeared more subdued, he could probably just pass off as a little odd. With all his practice he could walk down a human street and not recoil, he considered this one of his greatest feats. The only memories he had of humankind were bad ones, even with his fighting ability, his flames... He found humans terrifying.

He shook his head. No. He was a cold blooded killer. He brought pain and death wreathed in blue fl... Wait. THEY HAD A NEW FLAVOUR OF ICE CREAM? Chocolate peanut butter swirl, was this what dreams were made of?

Walking out of the ice cream shop, ice cram in hand, Rin turned his focus back onto his mission. There had been a room set up for him to stay in at a hotel at his destination, he could plan further when he reached it but he already had some idea of the method of his infiltration. He was heading for true cross city. It was fairly dangerous territory, full of exorcists, but it was possible to hide amongst humans and gather information. It was, after all, full exorcists. 

Half an hour later, Rin had boarded a train, reached True Cross city and left the train. He had finished his ice cream though, it was, as he had suspected, heavenly. Humans weren't totally evil, just terrifying, and deadly, and a few were uncomfortably lax on their morals... Rin wanted to finish this mission quickly.

He reached to the hotel, briefly confirming his booking with the receptionist before receiving his key and getting the hell out of there and up to his room. Number 066 huh? Whoever planned this must have been pretty upset that there wasn't another couple of hundred rooms here. The hotel was nice though, different from his quarters in Gehenna, it definitely had a different taste in décor but it was a pleasant change. Inside, he let himself collapse on the bed and drop the bag he'd been lugging around. He decided to wait a while before investigating. It was only natural, he was alone, unsupervised, a whole world of opportunities were open to him. He could go to nightclubs, he could get a cat, maybe party a little... Yeah, no. He was getting ice cream.

Walking through True Cross city in day light was a whole new experience. The last time he had been here was at night, being carried across rooftops as his consciousness waned; it had been very different. It was now full of life, full of people and full of food. He stopped abruptly. This shop had mango tango, he'd never tried mango tango... You will enrich your life immeasurably if you approach it with a sense of wonder and discovery, and always challenge yourself to try new things; obviously, Rin agreed as he had already bought two scoops of mango tango and left the store. It lived up to it's name, the mango seemed to dance in his mouth. He laughed at his own pun earning a few strange looks; he was vaguely self-aware in the sense of knowing his jokes weren't that good but he had been somewhat lacking of an audience in Gehenna. He quickly found himself in front of a cluster of green in the maze of a city, in other words a park. If was nice, trees, bushes, flowers... The whole deal. A nice place to enjoy some ice cream. Strolling in, Rin found himself captivated by the colour and life in Assiah's nature. It really was such a interesting, beautiful, little planet. Distracted as he was, Rin collided head on with the girl. Both consequentially stumbled backwards and Rin dropped his ice cream. He was heart broken.

"Oh, sorry." It was the girl, she looked pretty young. Cropped, blonde hair and twinkling, green eyes. Was she about to cry? She was rubbing her head, maybe they had collided harder than he thought.

"Yeah, sorry... are you ok?" Even though she was a human, he felt obliged to ask.

"err, yes, thank you," she let her hand drop to her side, shifting awkwardly. "Sorry I wasn't looking where I was going..."

"No, that fine, it was my fault too. I wasn't paying attention." He wasn't going to break cover now, running for the hills, he had found, wasn't well received.

"I'm Shiemi." She held out her hand. "Nice to meet you."

Rin shook it. "Rin." He looked over her quickly, a True Cross academy student. She gave him a quick, bright smile.

"Sorry, I have to get to prep classes..." She rummaged in her pocket, retrieving some spare change. "Sorry about your ice cream but this is all I have right now..." Shiemi awkwardly passed the change to Rin before side stepping him and running of in the direction she had been heading. "See you around, Rin!" She waved quickly before he lost sight of her around a corner, leaving Rin to stand alone. His hand cupped and full with a vibrant shade orange ice cream at his feet.

"Shiemi, huh?" He'd heard about these prep classes, a cover for exorcist training. Maybe, just maybe, this had been worth the sacrifice of his ice cream.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a little short but I'll try to do another update sooner than usual. Thanks for all your comments, I haven't said this recently but I still appreciate them all. Thanks for reading!


	5. Bundles of Fun

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update, I was in France for the week with no connection. It was painful. On a brighter note, the irony of this fic reaching 666 hits has not been lost on me, thanks everyone.

 

Shiemi had messed up. Having completely lost track of time, she had been forced to run all the way from her house to class, managing to knock over a complete stranger in the process. He had been nice enough about it but she still felt a little guilty. She almost hit herself when she remembered she could use her class key on any door; having only woken up less than ten minutes ago, Shiemi was pretty out of it. Dashing out of plain sight, she jammed the key into the closest door and rushed inside to the familiar corridor of the Exorcist cram school. She burst into class.

"Sorry, I'm late!" Shiemi hesitated in the doorway, waiting for an answer. She hoped he wouldn't be angry.

"That's ok Shiemi, take a seat." Thank god it just was Yuki fist thing. Smiling, she took went to her usual desk and settled down. Yukio started his morning lecture as usual, they were all starting new individual programs to further their chosen skills; aria, knight, doctor, dragoon and trainer. It was a small class but somehow they'd covered all sections. Shiemi was aiming for two, doctor and trainer; it was ambitious but she wanted to try her best to see it through. Yukio was already a dragoon and doctor, he was even a teacher at their age; she knew Yuki was an exception, he had been trained by a former paladin and he was already a genius. She'd never reach his level but she was determined to fight beside him, after all he had been the first person her own age she had ever met, her first friend too. There were other reasons of course but her attempts for professionalism suppressed those particular emotions; annoyingly the 16 year old girl in her resurfaced these feelings with a vengeance, determined to keep them in her thoughts. The 16 year old in her was also to blame for her lack of attention in classes as it remained fixed to Yuki's face, or was that his fault? Being all handsome and smart and...

"Shiemi?" She'd been side-tracked again, hadn't she?

"Um... Yes?"

"I asked you a question." He pushed

"Oh, right. Could you repeat the question?" She distantly heard Izumo groan.

"Alright Shiemi," Yukio readjusted his glasses. Probably for dramatic effect, he did that a lot. "I asked if you could recite the fatal verse for ghouls."

Shiemi was ready for this; she'd been practising fatal verses since their teacher had warned them of an upcoming topic test. She had this.

"This is the d-disciple which testi- testifieth of these... things, and..." She was wrong. She had not got this. It wasn't even in her grasp, what had she been thinking? Yukio looked at her expectantly, she could already feel the blush spread across her cheeks; no, her entire face was probably scarlet by now.  "and wrote these things, 'and we know that his, um... his testimony is true... 'I suppose that even the world itself couldn't, no... could not contain the books that should be written." It was... over. It was over. She felt herself burst into a smile despite her situation, purely from the sheer relief.

"Very good, Shiemi." He gave her a kind smile. "But a broken verse won't kill any demons. You probably would be dead by now." Shiemi's smile fell, her expression shifting into a mixture of panic and humiliation. "However, you did get the essential words right... You just need confidence. I understand that Aria is not your preferred class, but every exorcist needs to know the essentials to be successful."  The relief returned ten-fold. Good thing it was Yuki, not many teachers would be this kind to her. Yukio turned back to the board and started writing another verse, one they hadn't learnt yet.

"So, this fatal verse is for the kin of Amai... Shiemi, you can sit down now. Of Amaimon..." Finally noticing she was still standing, Shiemi sat back down quickly; picking up her pen with a determined look on her face, she was ready to take notes. Next time she would be ready. Wait, he had already started again. Furiously scribbling down key points from Yukio's lecture, Shiemi made the mental note never to say she was ready for something ever again. _Ever._

* * *

 

Rin had spent the day wondering the city. Tasting foods, seeing sights, marking routes, identifying possible exorcists... It was a bundle of fun. He needed one of their keys, a way to get inside the Vatican, then an escape route. It would be useful to know the locations of demons in the city, even being low level they could all serve a purpose; mostly distraction and chaos, but there was purpose there. Of course, when he found them some cowered, some bowed and all knew who he was; he supposed it would be a little ridiculous not to know about a new son of Satan, one with the blue flames at that. He thought he'd figured out why demons came to Assiah, not just for the chaos and mischief but the colours. The vibrant hues, the sounds, the tastes; for everything that was new, for all the life you could find. He could see why the two worlds would be called mirror images, all that Gehenna was, Assiah was not. The contrast was frankly incredible.

He would occasionally hear some whispers about him, he probably looked out of place gawking at everything, maybe they'd mistake him for a tourist... Although, not many other people were wearing all black; even with the heat up here, it was nothing compared to the wastelands of Gehenna.

He'd been walking around a while now, he had probably explored enough for one day. He knew he was creating excuses for procrastination at this point but he had passed caring. He finally stopped a few feet from a club.

"Pandemonium, huh?" Well, it's very name spoke of a wild, chaotic and disorderly experience. Perfect. He walked inside to be greeted by not just darkness but a cacophony of shouting, laugher and deafening music as well as the heavy scent of sweat and perfumes. There were a few neon lights placed around sporadically but other than that no other light source. It was already living up to it's name. The further he got in, the louder the music grew; maybe it was just his heightened senses as a demon but this was definitely too loud for a casual afternoon. He eventually reached what seemed to be the main parlour, a mob of dancing humans in the middle with little or no security around, it had the chaos part covered. At the back he saw a bar, what age cold humans drink? 17? 18? It was probably 18, he could pass for 18... maybe. It was true that Rin looked a lot older than his actual age, it was probably the hair, the muscles helped too. He took a seat an browsed the menu. Nachos? Oh, they came with a cheese sauce. Everything tastes better with cheese... Most things tasted better with cheese. Well he came here for the experience.

The bartender walked over, his eyes scanning Rin up and down before he spoke.

"What can I get you?" Right, he was in. It was reassuring that he could pass as 18, maybe he could get a drink or two later; humans were drinking alcohol all the time, it couldn't be too bad.

"Yeah, I'll get the Nachos special. With the cheese." Wow, real smooth. He had no idea how humans ordered things.

"Ok, coming up."

Huh, apparently he didn't sound like an idiot, or at least a complete idiot.

A couple of minutes later he was served his meal, it looked great. He found it to be both piping hot and delicious, and of course cheesy. Half way through the bowl a girl came up to him, smiling coyly.

"You're wearing a lot of black for summer." He looked up at her, her face was caked in make up, her general appearance tacky and she seemed to be looking him over. Was he meant to know her or something? He probably had to reply.

"Yeah?"

"So..." She continued smiling, "Whose funeral is it?"

"Wait." Rin replied, deadpan. The girl seemed taken aback. Giving an awkward laugh, she persisted.

"You're funny, what's your name?

"Rin." Rin wanted her to go away, he couldn't enjoy his nachos like this.

"Hey Rin, I'm Leiko."

"That's nice" He turned back to his food; maybe if he ignored her she'd go away.

"Haven't seen you here before..." She leaned on the bar counter, looking down at him expectantly. Did she really want an answer? Couldn't she just... Leave. "You seem like the time to hang around in places like this, I'm surprised you haven't come before" What was _that_ supposed to mean? He just hung around places with food. "You know, we could go somewhere else if you like. My place is close to here and..." At this point Rin had zoned out, her implications becoming clear to him.

"Look, I'm flattered but... No. I'm not really interested..."

Her face became flushed, her anger evident. With no drink to throw, she simply stormed of muttering something about 'leading a girl on'. Rin turned back to his food.

Eventually the club music grew too loud for Rin and he quickly made his way outside, pausing only a moment to pay. Walking into the light, he started walking around again in an attempt to continue his mission. He'd just been noting demon activity in a park when he heard a quiet voice behind him.

"Rin?"

He turned around to find a guy around his age, with brown short hair and glasses; did he know him? He decided against that thought when he noticed the exorcist uniform.

He thought he'd have lasted a little longer. Unfortunately, if someone had identified him, especially an exorcist, then he had only one option open to him. He would have preferred not to get involved, but when you have to kill... You have to kill.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, I figured Rin, having been in Gehenna for so long would have been a bit oblivious. Sorry it's a little short after so long but I hope you enjoyed this chapter!


	6. Friendly Conversations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm trying to do more regular updates again, sorry for any OOCness and spelling/grammatical mistakes. Sorry, it's pretty short.

 Yukio couldn't believe his eyes. It had been years but he still remembered his brother's face, vividly. It wasn't easy to forget; his twin writhing in blue flames, screaming. The very image of a demon, complete with horns and a tail. It had been 9 years but the features were similar enough to allow Yukio to seek resemblance between the two.  Raven hair, blue-tinted under the sun, and electric blue eyes with signs of puppy fat still clinging stubbornly to his angular face. Take away a few years and some height and throw in a haircut... It was practically Rin.

Of course, there were wasn't any concrete evidence it was Rin; mostly consisting of the factor that he was meant to still be trapped in the inescapable hell. There weren't any of the signs he was a demon, he didn't have the ears, horns and tail he'd seen before, nor the shroud of flames. He did respond to the name Rin, but it wasn't an uncommon name; nor was there anyone else in the park.

He felt as if the other was studying him too, his eyes darting around as they searched for familiarity, apparently finding none. Despite being so familiar to Yukio, those eyes were not Rin's. They were the same shape, same colour, but there was a certain coldness, a distant quality that separated this person from his brother.

Rin was just about to summon his flames when the exorcist apologized.

"Sorry," Thankfully, Rin's expression didn't betray the confusion he felt. "I thought you were... never mind."

The man shock his head before turning away, looking conflicted. What was that? He seemed to know even less than that guy. It was an unpleasant feeling.

* * *

Yukio was still feeling conflicted a few hours later. A mixture of anger and nostalgia having welled up inside him. The reassertion of fury at demons that caused his hands to shake, the reminder that demons tormented his childhood, took his brother, changed him brother and continued to wreck havoc in the world. Then he'd remember his fond childhood memories and get sad. It was a viscous cycle. He was in the process of brooding when he received a message from Mephisto.

_I have a message for you. Important. Come to my office in an hour. <3_

He couldn't suppress the resultant groan.

56 minutes later and Yukio was standing outside the headmaster's office, he knocked.

"Come in!" A voice rang out, muffled by the closed door. He opened it to find Mephisto lounging behind his desk. "You're early." He grinned wickedly. Yukio pushed up his glasses in response.

"You said it was important."

"Naturally" The young exorcist looked at him expectantly. "Something larger than your average low-level demon came through the wards."

"The wards? Isn't that their purpose? To stop higher level demons?" This was ridiculous, those wards were near flawless, anything that came through them were  part of Mephisto's design. "This wasn't you was it?"

Mephisto played at behind offended. "You doubt be so!" Yeah, with good reason. "No, it wasn't." Yukio couldn't quite tell but it was as if the headmaster's expression darkened, if only a moment before flickering away; it was too brief by far to tell. "You could say there was something different about it. Maybe it had human blood too, that wouldn't definitely confuse the wards; at least enough to let it through the gates..." Did he mean?...

"I couldn't be..." He didn't mean for it to be a question, he blatantly refused to accept the truth Mephisto was implying, especially after his earlier encounter. This time the playful front dropped.

"You already know Yukio. Rin." Dammit. "...and I'm guessing you've already seen something of him." Dammit. He looked down out of embarrassment.

"I think I've met him..."

"Where."

"You already know, don't you?

"The Gurin Park. I was correct."

"He seemed too different."

 "You'll have to ask Shiro on that." Fujimoto?

"What do you mean?"

"You'll have to find out." Mephisto smirked, breaking his serious expression. Despite his following questions, he was given no answers. He jammed the key to the Monastery into the office door on the way out; if it was Rin, there wasn't any time to waste.

* * *

It was quiet in the Monastery until Yukio burst through the door. Fujimoto almost fell of his chair, _almost_.

"What was that for?" He asked pleasantly, if a little flustered; he always enjoyed seeing his adopted son.

"What happened?" He sounded panicked.

"You're going to have to be a little more specific..."

"After Rin changed. You saw him in the cell didn't you?" No, Fujimoto was wrong. Yukio sounded more than panicked. In the 9 years since that day, he'd never asked about the time in that cell. He avoided it like the plague. Using only happy memories to fuel his hate.

"Yes" He returned quietly.

"And?"

"Why do you want to know?"

"I deserve to." Fujimoto was old, but it was then he felt all his years catch up with him. He sighed before beginning.

"He didn't remember me. He was scared. He... He wasn't acting like Rin." The old man continued, describing the events of the day while Yukio looked down and kept quiet. Too quiet, even for him.

 "Yukio, what's wrong?"

"Rin's back."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, this is probably the most dialogue I've written. Sorry for the lack of action, that's going to be changing soon. Thanks everyone for the support, I really appreciate it!


	7. The Chase

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, another early morning chapter. Still a little short but I feel this has become a bit of a habit.

The words had barely left his mouth before Fujimoto shot up from his chair and began assaulting Yukio with questions; the simplest being "Where?"

"True cross city." He could only follow in tow as Fujimoto stormed from the room.

* * *

Rin's current position: behind a tree. Well, it seemed they'd found out.

He should've just killed that exorcist. Then again, it probably would have ended like this anyway; subtly was not his forte, killing things was closer. Right then, however, he reasoned was not the best time for self-assessment, but there wasn't much else to do; exorcists were running crazy out there, he doubted there were even any civilians left on the streets nearby. Rin skirted from tree to tree, assessing his enemy; maybe two dozen of them, all armed, with scripture if not weapons. He needed an escape, a diversion; he could just fight his way out with blunt force but he would need a lot of strength to get home. He'd probably have to summon a Gehenna gate himself, but he wasn't that strong yet, he'd kill himself in the attempt if he wasted any energy. If there was ever a time he regretted not carrying around Kurikara, it was now. It could have been so much easier.

But, when the opportune moment arose, he didn't pass it up. His 'chance at home' happened to be a coal tar, lazily floating past. He snatched it out of the air, trapping it in his palm. It would be considered too insignificant to raise any concern from exorcists, for them it was akin to a bug, a pest; to him, it was a messenger.

"How about a little chaos?" He released his fist, finding the small demon hovering complacently. Something for once had gone right, it recognised him. He whispered an order to the coal tar before it hurried away. It was a few minutes latter when he allowed himself to smirk.

"Bring me a swarm."

First, the sky went dark. A curtain of back, veiling the moon.

His enemy seemed, to be put mildly, confused. Turning wildly in search of their assailant, they steeled their poses raising their weapons. No matter what they tried, whatever façade they attempted to show, they couldn't cover their trembling.

Next came the chatter. A million little voices, filling the sky. 

The exorcists were panicking, it was no wonder. The strings of eerie curses and threats circling around them was immeasurable.  Surprisingly, none of them had caught on yet. They'd know soon enough.

Finally, came the screaming. Piercing the night.

Their realisation was amusing. Alone a coal tar was no threat, but group enough of them together and they could be deadly. The exorcists shot wildly, flailed with their weapons, but they could hardly move, hardly see, through the mass of bodies. Some screamed despite common sense, they were quickly followed by heavy thuds. They couldn't chant their precious sutras, they couldn't even open their mouths; if one coal tar got inside, they would rot your lungs. A painful, ugly fate.

The ones with some experience tried to brace themselves, bear out the storm. They wouldn't drop soon, looks like it was his turn.

He stepped out from his tree and into the melee. They parted for him, their prince. Rin couldn't very well walk out undefended, but he always had one weapon with him. He felt the familiar blue flames engulf his body. It seemed to be familiar to the exorcists too, or at least known. Satan's flames. Those that burnt the physical and the spiritual. Their struggle only increased.

His flames snaked out, avoiding his own kind to ignite the humans. Blue torches lighting up the night. Their tortured cries downing out the coal tar.

Eventually the screaming died out, but it's absence seemed so much louder. Rin walked on.

* * *

 

It was chaos at the Japan headquarters. Satan's child was running rampant in true cross city. They couldn't specify his location but from the series of attacks they assumed he was heading out of the city. Fujimoto and Yukio had gone through a long process to gain access to headquarters. Apparently 'they couldn't be too careful', and they were right. Yukio held no illusions over his twin. As soon a thy got in, they got equipped and were out the door; or at least Yukio was. After having quit being an exorcist, Fujimoto was delayed. He only had time to shout out to his adoptive son before Yukio left.

"Get to Rin! I'll catch up!" He hoped the old man didn't. His weakness was always Rin; even with his skill, he'd just get himself killed. The death count was already over 30.

He ran out with another wave of exorcists, they looked half scared to death; the ones that left before them more so. They wouldn't take taken anyone this dangerous before; none of them looked to have the experience to have fought one of the princes of hell, the closest they would have gotten would be memories of the blue night and that'd hardly make things better.

The group made their way down the streets, it wasn't hard to find the trail; just look out for flashes of blue and signs or carnage. They passes scorched streets and curled, charred bodies, sometimes just an impression of a person on concrete.

They kept waking to see signs of demon attacks, classified low-level demons massing to create a deadly force, an army. He was... making an army? Was that his purpose here? Were demon-kind going to start a war? The exorcist's duty is to protect humans from demons. Even if it was his own brother... Well, he had a job to do. 

* * *

Rin had screwed up royally, what made it worse was the irony that he did it as a prince. It was meant to be a _simple_  mission, gather information, have a look around the city. Now he had an army of assorted demons behind him and the Japanese branch of exorcists on his trail. He hadn't even completed his _simple_ mission. It was meant to be _simple_. _Simple!_ He missed the ice cream field trips he used to go on. Those days were simple. If he came back empty handed his father would be angry. 'The very foundations would shake' sort of angry. You know, unpleasant. Well, he'd gone this far already. Might as well go all the way.

* * *

 A group of exorcists paced down the empty street, weapons at the ready. They were terrified of course, but they were doing well to hide it. They did checks on every alley, every street, searching for Satan's son. So when the lone figure stepped out of the shadows in front of them they panicked and fired of guns at random, throwing holy water grenades and chanting sutras. They didn't dare summon familiars in their state, they didn't need more demons against them. Before any of their attacks reached the figure however, thy burst into flames. Apparently they were effective against... everything. Nothing reached them.

He looked over their way, electric blue eyes still striking behind the veil of flames, and smiled.

"I only need one." The demons poured in from everywhere. Rooftops, windows, doors. Everywhere. The Chaos Resumed.

The only man left was kneeling on the floor, restrained by demons, and quivering. Was he crying? Rin couldn't tell, the exorcist was looking down at the pavement.

"Good evening!" Rin raised his hand in greeting, walking over to the human. "I just want to ask a few questions, is that okay?" No reply, he offered his friendliest smile. "Let's start then. What's your name?" Still no reply. Unless snivelling counted, in which case he had confirmed he was crying. "My name's Rin; you've got a name, right?" Nothing. "Even demons have names... What does that make you?" Nada. "Of course, you're an exorcist. Aren't you? You don't co-operate with demons." Wow, he was rude. "Come on now, I'm trying to be nice." The man mumbled something. "Sorry, did you say something?"

"YOU KILLED MY FRIENDS!" Ah, an answer.

"Yes. But I was nice, you're still alive aren't you?" The exorcist continued to gaze intently at the concrete. "So in return you're going to answer some of my questions, ok?"

"I don't owe you anything." Oh, he was going to be bitter.

"Now, now. You're acting like you have a choice here. That's a little presumptuous, don't you think?" He grabbed the man by his chin, forcing him to meet his eyes. "Now lets start again. What's your name?" This seemed to be becoming a habit. Rin clicked his fingers and the demons holding his victim sprawled the human on the ground. Rin walked around the man. "And again..." He stamped his foot down on the back of the man's kneecap, rewarded by a sickening crunch and a scream. "What is your name?"

"MINORU!" The name was intermingled with his screams.

"A good start, Minoru." Rin smirked. "Next question."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... This changed quickly. Hope you enjoyed this chapter!


	8. Reunited

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this chapter happened. Enjoy.

All the streets Yukio passed through had gotten progressively worse, but none of them had been like _this_. There were charred and clawed bodies like the ones he had passed before; then there were maimed and mutilated bodies, imprints of bodies on the cement. It would be impossible to even identify the vaporised. This was the group that came before. At least, all that was left of them. He was close to finally retching when he heard a groan. It's owner was sprawled on the floor, his limbs at inhuman angles, twisted and broken. But the man was alive... and undoubtedly in a lot of pain.

Yukio rushed over to him, taking out his med-pack. But when he got close the man started whispering something, it soon became a chant. Just repeating "I'm sorry," over and over again.

"Don't try to talk." The guy was working himself up into a frenzy; if his heart rate rose anymore, he'd loose what little blood he had left more quickly. Yukio didn't know if he was going to make it in the condition he was. The exorcist was growing more and more frantic, making him a whole lot harder to treat.

"I told him!" This time was a scream. He had to calm him down somehow.

"Told who?" Yukio had to be cautious controlled.

"THE DEMON!" He started trashing, calling out a name. Rin. It was his brother. Of course it was. Anything that went wrong had been his brother's fault. They had always called him 'the demon'.

More medics arrived, as did another wave of exorcists. Yukio backed out of the growing huddle, letting the others treat the man. Someone had to catch up to Rin, and he wasn't letting anyone else die tonight. He ran on ahead.

There were calls behind him; calling him crazy, begging for him to come back, to not throw his life away. Yukio didn't listen. He just kept running.

* * *

There was a call behind him, his name. Curious, Rin turned around. It was thee exorcist from before, the young one not the screamer. Glasses. He was going to call him Glasses, it was fitting.

"RIN!" He called again, did he ever tell Glasses his name? Then again, he had seemed to know him before in the park hadn't he. He had seemed a little too young to have been an exorcist when he captured before.

He could sense the demons around him preparing to surge. That wouldn't do, he had a couple of... questions. He raised on hand, his palm open. The demons fell still.

As Glasses drew near, Rin took note of his expression. Pained, angry, conflicted; overall he seemed to be having a bad time. That was unsurprising to say the least.

"You seem pretty motivated!" Rin called out to him with a grin, "But do you know who you're dealing with?" Not many people were stupid enough to challenge him.

"You don't know who I'm facing!" What was that meant to mean? Was he being rhetorical? Menacing? Maybe he was just disorientated. The exorcist stopped a small distance away from him, a mid-range fighter then. They lapsed into an awkward silence. Well, Rin felt like it was awkward. The tension was thick enough to cut with a knife. He wondered who would make the first move.

"So... What's your name?" Rin was _pretty_ curious. But, to his disappointment, he got no answer. Unless bullets counted; in which case he got 7 maybe 8 in rapid shots. Duel pistols, classy.

A wall of blue flames flared in front of him, fast enough to save him the energy of dodging. The exorcist didn't bat an eye, he just switched potions and fired again. And again. And again.

"You're quite persistent!" It wasn't a lie... "Why don't you tell me your name! You might get a mention in my report, to commemorate your hard work!" The exorcist stopped, but his guns kept aim on Rin.

"You don't remember, do you?" It was barely audible, even for Rin's hearing. Remember what?

"Remember what?"

"7 years..."

"Remember what?"

"You don't remember!"

"REMEMBER WHAT?" His flames blazed, losing control. The demons around him already shrinking back. He had always found fear to be powerful. Fear of death, fear of pain, fear of the unknown. Right then, there was a lot Rin didn't know. What he was meant to remember, what this man feared, what he was meant to do now. He could kill the exorcist... But then he would have the overbearing knowledge that there was something he was missing for infinity. He could leave him alive... But that could raise complications or other questions that he just wasn't entirely prepared to deal with.

His father should have prepared a Gehenna gate by now, he just needed to create a link to signal his location. There was always the option to go out with a bang. Yeah, that sounded good. He could always get his answers later, right? He could deal with an empty gap in his memory a little longer.

Rin smiled, bringing his flames back under control. Just a little longer...

"As much as I'd love to stay and talk..." Rin dragged a nail across his palm, hard. He was thankful for claws then, the visual effect worked miracles for creating fear. "But I really must be going." He clenched his fist before letting the blood drip down onto the concrete.

The ground bubbled and rose, first into a frame, and then into faces. Moaning and crying.

"See you around, Glasses."  Rin jumped up onto the gate, gave a wave then stepped boldly into the fray.

Yukio couldn't help but watch as his twin disappeared, the gate following shortly after. The demon army dispersed, loosing their sense of purpose in the absence of their leader. In the silence to follow, the young exorcist just watched.

"My name's Yukio."

* * *

 

 The familiar motion sickness was underwhelming on his return to Gehenna. He couldn't tell if he was just preoccupied by his emotions or if he was genuinely building resistance to the whole 'travelling between worlds' business. Either way, he had a report to make. Rin made his way to the grand hall, it was going to be a little more interesting this time. He wasn't sure what to mention though; he'd bought ice cream, broken cover, led an army, tortured a man... Some things would get him in trouble, for others he'd get praise, and some would be ignored. But what would make him look good? It had been his first official mission after all.

Eventually he reached the hall, his thoughts as unordered as they had been before. The doors opened before him, the room was already lit. At the back of the room he heard laughter, loud and wild.

"RIN!" He didn't sound angry... Was it possible to be angry enough to become happy again, because that was a possibility. He had royally screwed up. Satan stood up, illuminated by his flames, and threw his arms wide. Oh no.

"MY SON!" Rin stood awkwardly in the doorway. What was he meant to do? He knew there'd never be any sympathy in this family, so he couldn't play innocent. He'd have to own up, wasn't entirely sure he would he able to deal with the following death sentence... but he'd have to own up. 

"I..."

"You did excellently! Better than I could have hoped!"

"Um..."

"I've already had several reports. An army? In a day?" He grinned wickedly. "You were perfect up there, perfect!"

Satan descended from his platform, walking towards Rin. When he finally reached him, his father, for the first time in his life, hugged him.

"You're ready." Rin kept standing awkwardly in the silence that followed, but the curiosity was overwhelming.

"For what?"

* * *

The clean-up was horrible. Hundreds of dead, out of everyone that faced Rin only 2 survived.10 bodies had been vaporised, there were no comforts for their families; for the others it was no better, they just had something to burry. In the following days there were political arguments, demon purges and hate crimes on familiars; there were also suicides and depression, break downs and resignations. Rin had come back and brought hell with him.

Mephisto may have been livid, it was hard to tell; he'd locked himself in his office. In any case, his plan had probably been messed up.

Some had been bitter over Yukio, for being a survivor, for being the brother of a demon; others treated him like a hero, for facing of the son of Satan and an army, for being a survivor.

When he reunited with Fujimoto, there were no words exchanged. Fujimoto just embraced his son, thankful that he was just alive. Naturally, he gave the old man all the information he could give; about Rin and what he was doing.

Fujimoto didn't want to believe him at first, he followed the classic sample. Disbelief, anger, resignation.

Maybe he had finally given up on his adoptive son. Ready to let go. Maybe he was ready to fight, because God knows they were going to need him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, this is a bit of a late chapter but a lot has been happening recently. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed reading


	9. Summoning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I accidentally deleted this like 6 times during writing. How am I so bad at this?

After his father congratulated him, Rin wandered over to his quarters. They were larger than the rooms he'd had before, more suited to a prince; the bed was comfier too, a feat he'd thought impossible. Despite of this, even when he collapsed on the bed he felt strangely unsettled.

You don't remember, do you?

Remember what, exactly? Rin still didn't know what he was talking about; admittedly he hadn't asked anyone about it, especially his father. Satan wasn't the approachable type. Never the less, he needed answers, and soon. He didn't like waiting. It caused too much tension. He spend hours just lying there, pondering; he did start thinking about food at some point, so it became a little jumbled. But one thing in his mind was clear, he did need answers, and he was going to get them one way or another.

Then the room started shaking. It was a surprise, to say the least. Was this a summon? Definitely not from a demon, humans then? He must have really dropped his guard. The shaking was starting to get on his nerves now. He had to give it to them, they were persistent; persistent and rude. However, they were offering a free ticket to Assiah, Gehenna gate free. It'd be rude of him to refuse.

* * *

"That he may give me true and faithful answer, so that I may accomplish my desired end, provided that it is proper to his office. This I respectfully and humbly ask in Your Name, Lord Satan, may you deem me worthy, Father."

Silence filled the room.

"Did we do it right?" A small group was gathered round a circle, all wearing dark robes.

"Is the sigil correct?"

"Ok, wait a second. We need a quiet place where you will not be disturbed; Myrrh; Black candles and Satan's sigil."

"Do we have enough candles?"

The confusion continued. They tried reciting the chant again and again to no avail.

"It's useless guys, It's not going to..." The candles wet out. The silence resumed. An instant later, they re-lit with blue flames; as did the whole circle

"See, when someone says something's not going to happen..." A voice rung out from the circle, a blurred figure in the flames. "Or that I'm not going to do something..." The flames subdued, receding to flickering lights across the figures body. "It just makes me want to do it. Rebellious nature I guess." The robed figures gathered back around the circle.

Rin looked around himself, hoods and dark cloaks. Cliché. They all seemed so... excited. One stepped forwards, their leader?

"S-Satan?" Nervous? Scared? He couldn't quite tell yet.

"That's 'My Lord' to you." They panicked, but the one talking quickly recovered.

"Our apologies, My Lord. We humbly welcome you to earth..."

"No."

"N-no, My Lord?"

"Your question, I'm not Satan. You came close though." Their disappointment was obvious. Rude. They started to get flustered.

"O-Our apologies, but... But we..."

"Did everything you could to summon Satan?" They looked sheepish, what were they? Amateurs? They were pretty strong to get this close. "Don't you think you'd need more candles for him? Maybe a few sacrificial goats?" He heard a mutters 'told you' behind him, followed by frantic shushing.

"Then, if I can be so bold to ask, who are you? uh... My Lord."

"As I said, you came close, I'm his son." The mood changed again, they were probably just happy they summoned _something_. "Would have liked a goat though..."

"My Lord, we humbly ask... we request that..." He was still stumbling over his own words when Rin zoned out, as adorable as it was, he really had to get going.

"As much as I'd love to, can't." These cultists were fickle in their emotions, excited one minute, disappointed the next, around and around in a circle; but their confusion was prevailing.

"But the circle! You can't leave the circle! You have to listen to us!" As fun as this was, he couldn't have them speak to him like this. He had a reputation after all.

"I don't have to listen to _anything_ you have to say." Despite the flames, the room grew colder, the shadows darker. "You must be new to this so I'll give you some tips." Rin looked around the room. "Rule number one, never summon a demon stronger than you." He stepped to the edge of the circle. "They'll turn on the weak. Of course, when you summon the prince of hell, no matter what defences you hide behind..." Rin stepped out of the circle. "You can never bind him." The men were running now, scrambling off in every direction. "Now I'm feeling generous today." He threw his arms open. "So run little men, RUN! The lights went out.

Rin was probably having too much fun with this, the men were staggering and screaming in the darkness. It was hilarious to watch, but he places to be. Things to do. Answers to find. But first, he needed directions.

* * *

"Train station? Yeah, two rights then you're on Gyoku street, then a left on the third exit and a right on the second and after that you've got another left on the first street, across the road and you're there. Did you get that?" Rin looked back at the man clueless.

"Probably... No."

"Ok, no worries." The guy continued another run-through of the directions; and another after Rin continued to fail comprehension. It had always been like this, even though they couldn't say it to his face; he was a slow learner for the theoretical.

"Do you want me to draw you a map?"

"Yes, thank you.

A quick sketch and a thank you later, Rin was on his way; consulting his 'map' every second step. Eventually, he reached his destination. It was crowded, it was unsanitary, it didn't sell ice-cream. This was pretty much the standard for every Assiah train station he'd seen.

Soon, he'd managed to get a ticket; those cultists should have known better than to leave possessions lying around a summoning site. It was common sense, but as he'd though before, they were amateurs. But they did have some money, enough to have bought a small goat. Or at least a few more candles.

The train was as crowded as the station, but Rin still managed to get a seat. There was no way he'd be standing up for an hour, it did come with the consequence of invaded space. Never the less, he was making progress. Soon he be able to remember what he was meant to, just you wait Glasses.

* * *

There was a new task for the students in the cram school at true cross academy. A pair assignment to travel outside the city in pairs and make feild reports on the demons there. Shiemi had been paired with Izumo, Yukio had said it was so they could 'grow as tamers'. She'd been happy enough about it; Izumo just tsked but that was pretty natural for her, she was probably happy about it too. _probably_. Shiemi wasn't going to dwell on it, after all, they were going to th Konroku-en Garden; it was her choice.

In the end, it had built up to her squatting amoungst the plants watching demon migration. It was curious, there were Greenmen, Dekalp, Goblins and Bariyon all traveling west together; of course, it was unnatural for them to even migrate in the first place. This would make a great report.

Eventually, her own curiosity grew too great for her to ignore. She did what any young exorcist wouldd do, follow the demons. She had gone uder and over bushed, around flower beds to eventually reach a small grove. Winding her way through the leaves, she reached a small clearing. There was a man in the middle, surrounded by the demons she'd been following. Was that...

"Rin?" He turned around, it was definately him. But what was he doing with all these spirits?

* * *

 Rin had thought it's be nice to visit some of the local attractions before the next train came in, and he'd ended up in these gardens. Somehow, every demon of the earth kingdom in the area had found out he was there. Probably, Amaimon's work. He seemed to have demons hiding in every patch of grass, eager to serve him. He couldn't tell if they were a welcome party, an intervention for his road trip or if he had suddenly become a beacon for his own kind. That'd be awkward in social situations.

"Rin?" There was a soft voice behind him. He looked back to see a small, blonde girl; she seemed... Familiar. Oh, of course. He'd met her before, in the park at true cross city.

"Shiemi, right?" Her face lit up.

"Yes! Um... It may sound stupid but... Can you..."

"See all the demons around me? Yeah. I have no idea why they're here either." It was only half a lie.

"So you can see them. Sorry, if you don't mind me asking, how?" She was so polite, so earnest.

"Oh... I... I got a scratch from one of those," Rin pointed at a goblin, "When I was young. Ever since, I've been able to see them." That's how it worked for humans, right? Please let his story be believable.

"Oh, I see." She smiled, it was like sun light. He resisted the urge to raise his arm and protect his eyes, he was pretty sure there'd be damage to his retinas after this. "What are you doing out here?"

"I've just been visiting places." Rin looked away, trying to seem cool despite the demons threatening to bowl him over. Shiemi looked around.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" She seemed to be truly captivated by everything around her.

"You like it around here?"

"Of course, don't you?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Do you know a lot about plants?" She looked back at him.

"No, not really. There weren't really... Any... Where I grew up." Understatement of the century; it was pretty much devoid of life in hell, especially in the centre. There it was mostly just land scorched by blue flames.

"No wonder you'd want to come here, then." She smiled again. "It was nice seeing you again, but I really must meet up with someone. Bye, Rin!" She ran off back through the trees.

"What a strange human." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ended up searching how to summon a demon for accuracy here... You sure can find some interesting sites. Anyway, thanks for reading!


	10. The Next Stop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, it's been a while, almost a month since the last update. Sorry about that, I could give a long and arduous excuse but in short the moral is: Plan well and don't back yourself into corners. I hope you enjoy the chapter!

As much as he wanted to stay... He didn't want to stay. Especially being swarmed by minor demons. It was uncomfortable to say the least. Untangling himself from the mass of bodies as delicately as possible, Rin left the gardens. He did have a train to catch after all.

Another couple of hour long rides and he had hit the last stop of the railway. At some point he must have taken the wrong train; true, he didn't really know where he was trying to go entirely in the first place, but a run-down old village was unlikely to be his final destination. Never the less, he was stuck there. No more trains until tomorrow, and Rin wasn't quite motivated enough to find out where he was, where he needed to go, and walk there after a day of travelling. He just wanted to sleep. He couldn't afford an inn if he was going to keep traveling tomorrow, so instead he simply walked through the village. Going wherever the wind took him, hoping for somewhere comfortable. After ten minutes of searching, he found himself at the base of a mountain, a small path winding up it's side. It wasn't too far from the village... Well, at least he'd keep out of sight, he didn't want any of the locals to be on his case... Sighing, Rin started up the path. Hopefully it wouldn't be damp.

After another half hour, Rin had reached the end of the path. It had grown dark but he could still see ahead. In front of him was a shrine, a little run-down but cared for; he supposed it reflected the village. It was pretty large compared to the simple village shrines he'd been to before, maybe it'd had some meaning in the past. But the past was the past. In any case, shrines were meant for spirits, and in a larger scale, for demons. It'd probably be fine, _probably._ Rin shuffled over, his movements dulled from his lack of sleep, and let himself collapse inside the shrine. It wasn't particularly comfortable on the old wood, but it was dry and sheltered; Rin soon found himself drifting off to sleep.

 

There was a man in front of him. Surprisingly, there was nothing else. It was all just... White. Blank space. The void. The only colour came from the man himself, and that wasn't saying much. His skin was pale, deathly so, but he still looked stronger than most, somehow healthier. He wore traditional Japanese clothing, all in white, with long silver hair tied back behind him. Was this a dream?

"Are you a dream?" The man looked at Rin, expressionless.

"No." Sounds like something a dream would say. "Even if I sound like someone from a dream, doesn't make me a figment of your imagination." Had he said that out loud? If he couldn't separate his internal monologue from real life he was going to have some problems. "Do not concern yourself. You did not speak. But you can't hide anything from me in my realm."

"Realm?"

"Yes, you are dreaming." The man stepped closer. "Yes, this is real. Yes, this is my realm." Looking closely, Rin noted a few features he'd missed, especially the ears. A demon's ears. "Your observation skills need some work."

"Noted." Rin stared at the man., or rather demon, blankly. "Can I ask why I'm here?"

"Can I ask why you were at my shrine?" Ah, so it was occupied.

"Exhaustion, mostly."

"You're quite honest."

"Apparently, I can't hide anything."

"Rude, too. If only you applied the same honesty to yourself."

"What?"

"A part of yourself you can't see."

"And you can?"

"Didn't I say something like that earlier?" It was hardly a question, more like a lack of care to repeat himself. He might have looked something along the lines of delicate, but he sure didn't act that way. The demon seemed mildly amused but said nothing, contented to continue looking down on Rin.

"Well can you show me?" He couldn't keep the excitement from his voice.

"You seem very interested. I can see why you'd want such memories back... But you don't even know what you're missing. Something like those could only bring you pain."

"Like what?"

"Emotions... Empathy, humanity. A few other things..."

"I don't care if it's painful! I need to know."

"You are quite impatient. But I don't think I can give you your answers right now." Rin could feel his anger rising.

"WHY NOT?"

"The same reason it was too soon to give you the truth back then. Your mistakes were made for you, I won't be making the same ones."

"IT'S NO USE SAYING THAT! I'm missing something important, and I'm not leaving until you help me get whatever I'm missing back."

"Then you can stay here for eternity, you'll last that long anyway."

"And you called me rude..." Rin shook his head in mock disappointment. He had already resigned himself to pestering this guy, he wanted answers, and he didn't care how undignified he'd have to look to get them.

"And I was correct." The two faced of for a few minutes before the man gave a deceptively gentle smile. "When you're ready to give up, give me a call." Then he vanished, like dust in the wind.

"That'll be never." Rin grumbled, settling himself down on white nothingness. If this man had wanted to test him, he'd picked the wrong guy.

* * *

In the void, he'd lost count of time. Minutes passed into hours and hours to days. At some point he'd felt kind of hungry. That had sucked. But, his resolve was iron. He'd sit here for however long it'd take. He knew he could survive without eating, the change would be uncomfortable, but he was ready. He was going to face anything that came his way. He was starving.

Geez, didn't this guy have anything better to do than bane him. Sure, he had eternity, but he was wasting the now. If anything, he could have at least given Rin the time.

Although he knew the bastard had heard his thoughts, the demon didn't reappear for a long time.

"It's been two weeks. Impressive."

"I do have eternity."

"Some people came to the shrine on the second day though... They panicked of course. It's not everyday you come across a comatose boy, lying inside a shrine."

"What?"

"You're in the village now, they all seem very concerned."

"Wait a second..."

"...They're taking good care of your body, the kind souls they are.."

"...Hang on..."

"But I'm afraid with the current demon attack, they might not be able to protect you, let alone themselves, being peaceful villagers and all..."

"Demon attack?"

"Oh yes. It seems quite serious. It's on a rampage."

"What are you trying to do?"

"Offer you a deal, Rin." Since when had he given him permission to use his name?

"What sort of deal?"

"I'm a demon, as you may have guessed. But these people are not. They're fragile, vulnerable, and beyond my help."

"Beyond your help? You seem pretty powerful, what's stopping you?"

"An old vow, a promise. I'm not exactly young."

"Then what do you want me to do?"

"Fight. Protect. Save. They are good people. You used to be something similar. So I'd ask you go in my stead, if you protect them, care for them, help them, then I'll give you what you're missing."

"So I just have to kill this thing?"

"You can kill it if you really want... You can do what you will... But this task alone will not suffice for you to earn your reward."

"Just tell me what to do!" The demon gave another gentle smile.

"That's not something I can do. I'll see you again, Rin." He brought up his hand, and the white washed away, leaving only a worn, wooden ceiling above him. He could hear the familiar sounds of chaos, emanating from outside. Well, the guy wasn't lying. Rin guessed he had a job to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, sorry about the delay; it's been a little busy with exams coming up and I was pretty sure I'd messed up the last chapter so I was having a few problems continuing. But, I promised myself I'd update before my birthday... So I actually managed to get this done before the early hours of the morning... Anyway, thanks for reading!


	11. New Beginnings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, it's another update. I'd like to thank Chibi for the comment, you are a lovely person.

Rin quickly jumped out of the bed he'd woken in, inspecting himself before running outside. No sword, no armour, nothing. He decided he'd need more consideration the next time he tried running away from home, maybe pack a few things... He could always use his flames but then every demon in Assiah would know where he was. Maybe someone in the village would have a weapon, but it was doubtful.

Rin pulled a man out of a group running past him.

"Where is it?" He asked quickly, ignoring the man's look of surprise.

"You... But you were just..." As the villager struggled for words, he was interrupted by a roar.

"Never mind." Rin turned away, sprinting towards the noise. After a few paths he found the demon. A Cat sith to be specific. It was swiping at the near bye buildings but none of the villagers seemed to be too hurt, just a few scrapes and bruises. Aware of his lack of tact, Rin chose the straight forward approach. He approached the demon slowly,

"Hey? Stop!" The demon turned towards him, growling; but he still heard the words behind it. He was a demon after all.

"Go away! You're all liars!" Rin knew it had to be truly distraught to ignore that it was talking to kin, that or confused. It was yelling something about liars so it was probably already borderline crazy.

"What do you mean? Liars?" The Cat sith's eyes widened, maybe something had settled into place inside it's head, but it had to have recognised he was a demon now.

"You can hear me?" Apparently not.

"Yeah... I _am_ the pr... A demon after all." The other demon blinked at him, too surprised to act. "Anyway, what do you mean 'Liars'?" Without weapons, all he had to offer was the diplomatic approach.

"The humans!" Rin took a step closer. "They said Shiro doesn't want me anymore!" Tears pricked at the corner of the demon's eyes. "They won't let me go back!"

"Shiro?"

"My owner." An exorcist then. After Rin's little parade they were probably expelling demons from their leagues now. "They won't even let me see him! I want to know what's going on, but they won't tell me!" The Cat sith started flailing again, leaving large claw marks in the ground and buildings, tearing through metal as if it meant nothing. It definitely wasn't a weak demon. This 'Shiro' must have been pretty strong.

"Hey now, calm down! You'll hurt yourself." Rin doubted that was likely, but if this commotion got exorcists on his track he would get hurt. Familiar or not. HE took another step towards the demon. "Just calm down, Okay? This guy, Shiro, he hurt you right?" The demon focused it's attention back on Rin, just as hurt looking as it'd been before. "So just tell me a bit about him, let's just sort this out."

Rin couldn't tell if he was trying to find out because it was a way to resolve the situation or because he had developed some misguided form of empathy at the sight of another hurt demon clueless about it's circumstances. At any rate, he'd become pretty curious.

"He... He was old, but kind. He was stronger than any of the other exorcists, he wouldn't have just let me be taken away! He'd never leave me! He trusted me with the gates of the city..."

"True cross city?" The demon nodded at him. Yeah... It was probably his fault. He needed to recover this somehow, be trustable. Had he ever even know how to do that in the first place? "Well... That must have been a _pretty_ important job." Thankfully, the demon didn't detect his awkwardness, it's face lighting up.

"Of course! He trusted me! And I may not look it but I'm _pretty_ powerful!" Oh, the cat sith definitely looked the part.

"Then he must have had a good reason for sending you away..." Yes, a very good one. "From what I've heard he wouldn't have done it for any small reason..." Attacks from demon armies were normally pretty large. "Maybe it was for your safety or to protect you." He could have said maybe it was because of him but that was almost certain that was a definite. The demon was starting to calm down.

"There were people talking about the prince of hell..." Rin let out an awkward laugh.

"Well... That must be it!" Rin took a step closer. "See it's all okay. He was probably just keeping you safe from exorcist extremists."

"Yeah!"

"I'm sure when this all blows over you can go back to him. So... Why don't you just calm down for the while?" The demon was visibly relaxing now, Rin decided it was probably safe. "So, why don't you tell me your name?"

"I'm Kuro!" Pretty fitting for a black cat sith.

"Nice to meet you, Kuro. I'm Rin!"

　

After Kuro had calmed down, Rin understood the comment about not looking the part. He was about as large as a common house cat, and seemed to have taken Rin as his new owner. If only temporarily, he wasn't a bad companion. The villagers returned when they realised it was safe. Some were still hung over the fact that a previously comatose boy and jumped to the village's rescue and others were celebrating his 'victory' over the demon beast. After they found out he had nowhere to go he got numerous invitations to stay with excuses like 'they'd need someone to help if more demons came through' or 'let us pay you back'. It was a little discomforting to be genuinely rewarded for nice deeds for once; but, ignoring the irony of the situation, Rin agreed to stay and help. It would have been more than a little rude, not to mention unconventional, to say he'd stay for the free food and shelter.

What had the dream guy said?

This task alone will not suffice...

Well, he wasn't usually one for trusting strange dream entities, but he figured if the man, or rather demon, could keep him in a coma for a couple of days then he really wasn't a figment of his imagination. He said he couldn't tell Rin what to do, but he guessed it was along the lines of helping people. If that's what he had to do to regain his memories then he guessed he'd have to play the good guy. Even the son of Satan could have a heart. Well, at least he should, he was living the last time he checked.

He'd managed to get a place in the village's inn. It wasn't much, especially compared to royal chambers, but it was nice, homely even. It felt somewhat familiar, but he was pretty certain he'd never shared a room with anyone. He'd designated the bed to Kuro in the end, though the cat seemed content to sleep on Rin. After all the villager's attention, not to mention the dealing with everything still having left over effects of having been comatose, Rin was exhausted. It wasn't long till he drifted off too.

　

"You've done well." The white room was back again, along with it's usual inhabitant.

"Please don't tell me you're going to trap me here for another month."

"You're over-exaggerating, it was only two weeks."

"You say that as if it wasn't a long time." The man raised an eyebrow

"Excuse me, but it was you who chose to say."

"You were the one that wouldn't tell me anything!" He looked mildly irritated.

"I might not still if you continue this."

"You're what? Centuries old? You won't even tell me your name!"

"You don't need to know."

"You know mine!"

"You really are a child, even if you have matured this quickly."

"Hey!"

"Don't you want to know why I summoned you here?"

"Wait, this is a place? I thought this was inside my mind." Rin did have to admit he doubted it'd be quite _this_ pure but he had wanted to hope.

"You could say it is both a place and inside your mind..."

"My head's hurting."

"I think it'd be for the best if I just told you."

"Tell me what?"

"I have your attention now? Good, you've already wasted most of our time. Someone's following you."

"What?"

"He's following you, Rin." The man looked mildly annoyed just before the white ended. Judging by the birds chirping outside his window, it was already early morning. "What?" Rin sat up, ignoring the protests of Kuro. "WHAT?"

　

The dream demon didn't reappear in the next week, leaving Rin paranoid and confused; for all the skill in his vocabulary, the guy must have the mental age of a child. Naturally, Rin had asked Kuro to keep an eye out, occasionally sending him out scouting. For the most of the time, he just kept the familiar close, occasionally sparring with him as an excuse; Kuro seemed to enjoy sticking around him anyway. Something about Rin being like Shiro, he didn't like being compared with an exorcist but he assumed it was a compliment. The way he put it, it sounded like one. The cat sith was always so full of admiration, you'd think the guy was a god, but gods didn't abandon people. Maybe that exorcist was the one following them; trying to recover his familiar. Normally an exorcist would just summon their demons when they wanted them, as if demons were just tools, made for them to command.

On the topic, Rin found himself faced with a disconcerting realisation. Aside from Kuro, he hadn't seen any demons. No green men or goblins, not even coal tar in the air. Something was stopping them. Someone _was_ following them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd say I might not update for a while because of exams, but I've said that before and I know I'll end up writing more chapters; so, until next time, thanks for reading!


	12. Village Hero

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The manga is a treasure, y'all should catch up with the manga.

It hadn't taken much convincing from the village's residents to make Rin stay; he'd already been looking for somewhere to hide from his father and the people there already seemed opposed to the exorcist organisation. Not to mention it was the only way to get the white demon to tell him what he was missing. The humans had all seemed in awe of him before, seeing him as a blessing from their protective spirit. They weren't wrong, it seemed their spirit and the white demon were the same, and he had sent him after all; but it was strange considering all the information he'd been given on humans before. Self-serving, greedy, fickle. He'd ended up with doubts over any human he'd met, always trying to figure out their motives; even the girl he'd met before, Shiemi, had to have some kind of incentive, she was human after all.

At the moment, there weren't many people Rin could trust. The demons weren't coming close, either under his father's, or one of his brother's, orders; or it was an exorcist, sweeping the forest. Either way, all of them would be after him. Even if they didn't know now, the villagers were humans, who'd eventually find out he was a demon. Rin could only trust in their fear of others, the fear that'd keep them cowering behind him; even if that fear ended up turning to him, he could trust it'd exist. He'd been lying on his bed, pondering hi situation, when he felt something nudging at his chin.

"Hey, Rin. Rin, hey." The nudging didn't stop until Rin opened his eyes and turned to the source, naturally, it was Kuro. "Rin, I'm hungry." Sitting up, Rin ruffled his friends head; his common sense may have been against it, but he trusted Kuro.

"Then why didn't you get some food?" Now seen as Rin's pet, the villagers had started treating Kuro as well as Rin; if he meowed politely enough, he'd probably get half the inn's kitchen stores.

"I was waiting for you!" When he thought about it, it was probably Kuro's unconditional trust of him that made Rin trust him back.

"Come on then, we can see what they've got." Kuro jumped of the bed as Rin stood up, running around his feet as his friend tried to leave the room. "Hello?" Rin called, his voice was still ringing in the air when a woman appeared from behind one of the various doors, carrying a pile of sheets.

"Ah, You're awake!" She appeared a little flustered, he couldn't tell if it was because she wasn't used to guests or if it was just because of who she was talking too. "I can get someone to make you some breakfast if you like or..." Panicked, the woman dropped the sheets, dropping down to the floor to recover them.

"That's fine, I can get it myself..." Rin watched the woman fumble as she tried to gather her bearings, he almost felt a pang of pity. He knelt down beside her. "Here, let me help." The woman became more distressed, as she tried to assure him that she was okay; Kuro, on the other hand, continued to flounce around, still excited by the prospect of food. When the pair stood up again they were sharing the load, the women seemed abashedly thankful and she fumbled out her gratitude.

"This way..." She indicated awkwardly, turning left down the corridor. Rin, in the attempt to mistake his sympathy with something closer to sense for him, decided to use his situation as an opportunity to gather information. He couldn't decide what to search into until he saw the woman watching Kuro.

"I've noticed you can all see him." The woman turned her attention to him, surprised. "Kuro, I mean. You all ran from him before, and you can all see him now." She looked down before turning back to him.

"We've been attacked before, the exorcists only arrived after the demons had left, they didn't stop to help, they only moved onto the next location. Most of us have been able to see _them_ since, there haven't been many that want to hurt us, despite what the exorcists have said. I suppose we've learnt to live with them..." Her explanation had left Rin a little confused, he had understood everything she'd said, but it was strange to hear humans that didn't condemn demons. He'd just figured humans like that were odd cases, but an entire village of them... It was strange to say the least.

"You must not like exorcists then..." Rin cursed his lack of subtly as he waited for an answer. She seemed thoughtful for a little while before giving her response.

"Not really, they've never done anything for us, and when we needed them they neglected us... We don't really welcome them here... I suppose that's why we want you to stay..." It made sense, none of them knew how to fight. Since ' _one task would not suffice'_ , Rin thought he might as well follow the village hero route.

"Don't worry, I'll protect the village as long as I stay!" The woman's face lit up.

"Really?"

"Of course."

"Thank you! I'm sure the whole village will be relieved!" She became increasingly flustered again as Rin patiently listened; eventually they reached her destination and Rin dropped of the sheets as the woman continued her thanks. It didn't take long afterwards for Rin and Kuro to reach the kitchens, they'd been offered food a few other times, but Rin was resolved to make it himself. It would be the first time he'd cook after all; ever since he'd snuck into the palace's kitchens when he was young, he'd always thought it looked fun. Now, confronted with more foods than he'd ever seen before in his life, he could hardly contain his excitement. Naturally his years of training caused him to analyse his situation first, this however only led him to sit down and flick through a cookbook with the glee of a small child. Soon he had started cooking, his ingredients fetched by Kuro as soon as he needed them; he didn't strictly follow the instructions however, it wasn't because of his rebellious streak but rather due to his acute senses that led him to choose his own measurements. Soon the smell of his cooking had filled the kitchen and started to leak into the rest of the inn, drawing in various curious workers. Before he knew it, Rin had already served his food to various different people that passed by; it took a while until he could finally serve himself and Kuro. When he exited the kitchen to sit at a table, the room was already filled with people and cheer. They quickly became aware of his presence and started thanking him and drawing him into conversation, although he had tried to refuse at first, he quickly became immersed with the rest of the humans. He'd have to add a few features to his description, humans: self-serving, greedy, fickle, friendly.

* * *

When he'd left the room and humans behind, more pressing matters came to mind.

_He's following you, Rin._

As cryptic and irritating as the white demon was, he had no reason to lie. Well, could have, but Rin was already following his orders, he was already helping him, so he'd have no reason to deceive him. He'd already considered the possibility that the white demon had been lying from the start, but he'd known. He'd known Rin was missing something, missing memories. As desperate as Rin was, he had little other choice than to trust him. He'd seen evidence of it too, the silence in the forests, the lack of demons. It was  a small change but it spoke of a large problem. If someone got rid of _all_ of the demons in an area, they had to be powerful; which, by default, meant Rin had to find them. When they were alone, Rin finally told Kuro about the suspicion that someone was watching him, only leaving out the existence of the white demon; he'd asked him to go scouting before but he'd never actually filled him in. It was comforting to hear him swear vigilance for Rin's sake, the cat sith had practically become Rin's familiar over the few days he'd known him. What made him interesting was his lack of allegiance to his father, he'd been devoted to this 'Shiro' before he'd abandoned him, and now he was loyal to Rin, just because he was Rin, and not because he was the prince of Gehenna.

"How do we find him?" Kuro's question snapped Rin out of deep thought.

"Maybe if I go into the forest alone he'll come out..."

"Alone? If he's after you I should stay with you," He crouched down, as he were about to pounce. " _In the shadows."_ Rin laughed before correcting his friend.

"If they're as powerful as we think they are, they'll know if you're there. They've cleared out all the other demons, there aren't even any coal tar. I'll go alone, if they confront me, I can get them; if they come into the village, you can watch them and report to me." Kuro sat up strait and started nodding with as serious of an expression as he could muster to Rin's words.

"Got it."

"Great, I'll head out now."

"Right now?" Kuro jumped up. "It's dangerous! Shouldn't we wait a little while?" As endearing as Rin found Kuro's concern for him, he had to get things moving.

"The longer we wait the more they learn, besides, I may not look it, but I'm pretty strong too!"

"Really? Now I really want to go and watch!"

"No, Kuro. I need you to guard the village, you're strong so it'll be easy for you!" Kuro lightened up at the praise and eventually gave in, promising not to follow Rin into the forest. As Rin left the village, Kuro clambered up onto a rooftop to act as sentry, some of the children in the area had gathered to watch him make the climb, but Rin didn't have the time. It was disconcerting, walking through a forest without demons. It felt empty, wrong. Even if you couldn't see it, there was always life buzzing around in Assiah, it wasn't like Gehenna. It was meant to be green and full of movement, but now even the animals weren't stirring. With a fast pace and determination, Rin was soon carried far into the forest.

"Hey, Little brother." Rin turned to the voice, instinct taking priority over thinking, the voice had sounded familiar.

"Amaimon!" His brother was sitting languidly in a tree, accompanied by his favourite familiar, Behemoth. "You're the one that's following me?" Rin couldn't tell if he was meant to be happy or worried.   

"Technically I was watching you, you haven't moved for a month, were you sleeping?"

"Comatose, actually."

"Same thing, how did that happen?" Even with the feign of nonchalance, Rin could still see a mix of concern and curiosity in his brother's eyes.

"Bad circumstances." Amaimon raised an eye brow but didn't question him further. "Enough of this, why are you here?"

"So father isn't."

"What?" Amaimon leapt down from his perch to land beside Rin.

"Why do you think the demons are gone? I may be the king of earth, a prince of hell, but who do you think demons fear more, me or our father? They'll follow my orders, but if they see you they'll report it, regardless of the circumstances."  Rin's expression softened as he understood what was going on. "Those gardens you are in have already been overrun; father might come up himself if you made a fuss again."

"I haven't been a fuss!" Offended, Rin flung his arms wide to stress his innocence.

"Last time you were here you lead an army in the heart of true cross city." Amaimon pointed out.

"An honest mistake!" Rin smiled at his brother, hoping he'd drop the subject.

"Why did you even run away in the first place?" The smile hadn't worked, it'd only brought on a worse topic. Rin tried to shrug it off.

"You know, reasons. Teenage rebellion..." It didn't work.

"You're not giving me the truth." Amaimon posed bluntly.

"Yet I'm not lying either." Amaimon gave him a frankly disappointed look.

"Really?" When Rin looked closer, it was more akin to disbelief, probably aimed at Rin's response.

"Yep. So you can go home, I'll be fine!"

"If I go home you'll be dragged, kicking and screaming, back to Gehenna."

"Lovely."

"What are you hiding Rin?"

"Nothing, nothing at all."

"Rin... You're not... Are you going against father?"

"What? No!" Although Rin was pretty powerful, although he had run away from home, going against Satan seemed honestly terrifying.  

"If you were lucky you would only be tortured, you'd probably end up confined to quarters for a century too. That wouldn't be fun. No-one else enjoys ice-cream as much..."

"Amaimon, I'm not that stupid."

"Good, so tell me. Why?"

"More than one of us wants the truth here."

"Don't tell me... You are quite the troublesome little brother, aren't you."

"Do you know? What I'm missing." Amaimon was amongst the few he trusted, if he knew, then he'd save so much time, their father wouldn't even have enough time to get mad at him.

"I know that you're missing something, but I don't know what that is."

"Ah,"

"How do you plan to find out?"

"I... Can't tell you,,,"

"Ah," Rin looked away from his brother awkwardly,

"Yeah,,, Just give me a few months, that's all, then I'll come home." Amaimon looked at his little brother questioningly.

"Time may be irrelative to us; but the same rules don't apply to father's rage."

"Yeah, I know. Please?" Amaimon sighed.

"Fine. Just remember to come back, one brother has stuck around here long enough, don't make it two."

"Don't worry," Rin grinned. "I won't."

"And don't get into the culture."

"What?"

"One brother was enough." Rin gave Amaimon a black look.

"...Okay." Exchanging parting words, Rin headed back into the village while Amaimon settled back into the tree with Behemoth,

"What a troublesome little brother."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, 18 chapters... When this is finished I'll try and condense them into fewer chapters but unit then, enjoy this mess of a fanfiction. I'm sorry for the late update, it's almost been a month, but I've got a load of free time now so I'll try to get everything back on some kind of schedule. Anyway, thanks for reading!


	13. Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally managed to get out another chapter, sorry for the wait! Thanks for all the comments and kudos!

"Hey, hey Rin! I guarded the village!" As soon as Rin emerged from the trees, he was jumped on by Kuro, obviously proud of his small achievement.

"Good job, Kuro!" Rin cheered, indulging the small demon's pride. Kuro kept on about his watch as the pair headed back into the village, although he took his time, it wasn't too long before Kuro remembered why he had to act sentry.

"Who was in the forest?" As much as Rin had wanted to avoid talking about his trip, Kuro's hopeful eyes showed no sign of giving up.

"Nothing, I was just imagining it." Rin couldn't tell if it had worked, Kuro had been gullible in the past but he seemed pretty invested in finding out this time.

"Really? But you were so certain!"

"Ah, I was wrong." Kuro looked at Rin in disbelief.

"You can be wrong?" Rin wondered if his ego could take that remark. After thinking about it, he decided it couldn't.

"Not wrong, just paranoid." He decided that sounded better. A little more unstable maybe, but better. Kuro nodded, and looked back ahead, towards the village. After humming for a while, he started talking to Rin again, spilling out mindless thoughts whilst Rin thought back to his conversation with Amaimon. He knew his father would be angry at him, furious. Hell's wrath was feared for a reason. All the same, he needed to find out the truth, he doubted he'd be allowed out of Gehenna any time after this 'fuss', and he wasn't prepared to go on ignorant for millennia. It hadn't even been a decade and he couldn't take it. He'd been told he was impatient because he was still infantile for a demon, apparently after a century or two he'd calm down. Even if he did, it was like an itch he couldn't scratch. He needed to find out, which meant he needed to help the white demon, which meant he had to help the village, which meant his head hurt thinking about it all. All the same, he knew what he had to do, and he had to do it quickly. He had to be helpful... _friendly._

Everyone seemed to take notice when he arrived back in the village streets. Passing greetings and making remarks about the weather; he'd learnt to return the pleasantries... Eventually. He assumed it was a human thing, but it wasn't so bad. He'd soon found himself back into work for the village, moving the heavy loads, helping the people around him, rebuilding the houses. It was a lot easier to distract himself in his work or his goal than think about the other things on his mind. The welcome he'd get in Gehenna, the truth that's been hidden from him, the growing tension between humans and demons. Yes, Rin found it a lot easier to focus on the task at hand.

It hadn't taken too long before he started learning names, then streets, then families. He had been trained to remember what he learnt in the field from a young age, and for some reason it seemed to come easy to him, being sociable. With demons and humans. He didn't have to be told it was an odd quality, especially for a demon prince. He wondered what Amaimon would think if he watching, well, as he had proven, was watching. Would he assume Rin was simply acting, or that he had become soft; would he become concerned and tell their father, become suspicious and find the white demon, or stay quiet. He couldn't tell. Hopefully in any case his brother would be too entertained or interested to do anything other than watch, which should be the case as long as Rin didn't do anything to suggest he'd stay. He tried to keep any interaction to a minimum, but somehow he'd found himself becoming part of the community. He couldn't cut off all the ties, the white demon wouldn't tell him what he needed to know if he did, but he couldn't get closer to them for the truth. He if helped more and got closer to the community, Amaimon would intervene. He almost couldn't wait to get back to Gehenna. _Almost._

"Tired, are we?"

"Huh?" Rin looked around wildly, in search of the voice, but all he saw was white. _White?_

"In front of you, Rin." Rin whipped around to the voice.

"You!" A few steps away was the white demon, looking far too amused for Rin's liking. "Why did you..."

"Bring you here?" Rin nodded. "You seemed to be having a few difficulties." After that he pouted.

"I'm fine, there's nothing here I can't handle!"

"Difficulties morally."

"Ah." Rin looked away from the other demon for a few moments. "So... Are you going to tell me what I've forgotten?"

"Not now." Rin internally cursed. "But I can tell you something else. Do you want to know the difference between demons and humans?" The white demon's question earned him a quizzical look. "It's not that they don't feel, but that they feel too much. You should already know this, your senses are sharper than humans, you see more, hear more, you experience more. This goes for all areas, unlike humans, a demon's emotions will consume them. Anger, fear, jealousy, greed, love... There's a human saying, too much of something, even a good thing, is bad for you. So, Rin. What are you feeling?" Rin was a little taken back by the question.

"What do you mean?" His mind was whirring, trying to figure out what he was meant to be feeling. "Well, what are you feeling?" Rin asked defensively, trying to buy time.

"Right now? Deep concern."

"Very funny." Despite Rin's assumption he'd been joking, the white demon regarded him for a little while, completely serious, his eyes fixed on Rin's.

"As you are now, I wouldn't be surprised if you were overcome by curiosity or fear. You're risking a lot for a few memories."

"Fear?"

"Of course, Satan is quite the daunting father figure..."

"Wait a second, I don't remember telling you about..."

"...And of course, you're getting dangerously close to regaining a few things of your own. You've been pretending for a long time, maybe it's started to become real..."

"Could you _please_ tell me what you mean." The white demon's expression became softer as he looked at the other, some emotion unidentifiable seeping into his eyes.

"For a demon, you're far too human, Rin." Rin's eyebrows furrowed in his uncertainty.

"Just tell me, okay? _Please._ "

"Rin, I'm going to ask you again, are you sure you want to know?"

"Is that what this is about? Of course!"

"Rin..."

"I'm sure!" Rin took a step forwards, carried on by his enthusiasm. "I need to know! I have to..." The white demon raised two fingers and placed them on Rin's forehead.

"I know. Then, remember."

* * *

Rin woke up slowly, he didn't usually have problems in the mornings, but today he felt tired, his body heavy. He could feel the weight on Kuro at the foot of his bed, he could hear the birds chirping by his windowsill, he could see the beams of sun light, streaming in from the window; but there was only one thought on his mind. Two words.

"Rin Okumura"

He wasn't entirely sure what he was saying, or what he now knew; but he was certain that was his name. Rin Okumura. It was strange thinking about it, he'd only ever had one name, Rin; he'd always been addressed as 'my lord' or 'master Rin'. It was a rule of thumb that demons had one name only, and maybe a title, but having two names... It was almost like a human.

After his name, it came through in drips and drabs. An image of a monastery. A school. A park. An alley. Places he recognised, but didn't know, those memories hadn't come yet. He tried to continue what had become his daily routine, still a little preoccupied with his new thoughts, he had to constantly reassure the residents that he was just tired or 'out of it'. By the end of the day, one face kept coming back to his memory. An old man in a priest's outfit, a kind face behind glasses. He found it a little strange that a priest came to mind considering that he was a demon, but there so many images of him. They reminded him of some of his earliest memories, looking up at others; it led him to think he had known him when he was younger, but the strangest thing was that all the images seemed to be in Assiah. There was too much colour, too much life in the memories, for it to ever be in Gehenna.

After one memory, he came to a clear conclusion. When he was younger, he'd been taken captive. There was no context in the memory, but he could remember pain, so much pain, and an image. Exorcists all around him, the man, looking horrified, and blue flame, surrounding him. Even the memory of it was unbearable. he wouldn't have been surprised if he'd tried to block the memory out. By the time he was in bed again, he had a name for the man.

"Shiro Fujimoto." At the name, Kuro's ears perked up.

"Shiro, you know Shiro?" It was a name he'd heard many times from Kuro. Shiro Fujimoto, the man that had abandoned Kuro.

"I need to find him." Kuro leapt up from his usual position at the end of his bed.

"Why?"

"Just trust me, Kuro. Can you take me to him?" Kuro looked nervous for a few moments before returning to his usual, bold self.

"Of course! You're really strong! Aren't you, Rin?" Rin grinned.

"Yep! Can you take me tomorrow?"

"You'll have to tell the villagers." Rin took that for a 'yes'.

"I know."

"Can we get some catnip of the way?" Rin shrugged.

"Sure."

Kuro was fully awake now, jumping around their room.

"Yes!" Rin watched him for a little while before turning off the lights.

"Night, Kuro."

"Night, Rin!"

* * *

The next day Rin announced he was leaving the village. Naturally, it was met with a chorus of 'whys?' and disappointment. He _was_ the village hero after all. They'd all tried to pile parting gifts on him as he left as well as ask if or when he was returning. Over the last few months, he'd become an important part of the village; helping rebuild it, tending the injured (unsuccessfully), and working in the fields. There was no-one else in the village that could do so much without injuring themselves, it was practically expected that _they_ would be sad when he left, but he still felt a pang himself. Maybe he could come back after his father forgave him and let him leave Gehenna again. He wasn't quite sure but surely _some_ humans would be alive after a century.

For a while, he hitched a ride on Kuro after the demon had reverted to his full size and bounded through field upon field. He recognised some of the landmarks on his way, and from some of the signs he passed he already knew where he was being taken. True Cross city. He wasn't sure how he was going to actually enter the city again; the front door was out of the question considering his status and he was guessing forget and forgive wouldn't apply in this situation. Eventually, he had to dismount Kuro and travel by human transport; although pets were prohibited, he was sure demons were fine. After all, no-one else was going to see Kuro. 

It had gone surprisingly well, and soon he found himself in front of the city's front gates. He remembered then how vital it was to have a plan, he also remembered that he had none, what-so-ever. He wondered how many exorcists still remembered and hated him after his last 'little' intrusion. Probably all of them.

"Ah, Kuro?"

"Yes, Rin?"

"Demons have been chased out of the city, haven't they?"

"Yeah..." Kuro looked away. "A few months ago."

"How do you think we should get in then?" Kuro's face scrunched up in concentration for a few seconds before he looked back at Rin with a serious expression.

"I have no idea." It might have just been from the weight of the tension, but Rin burst out laughing.

"You shouldn't have said that with such a serious expression, stupid." Kuro joined in with the laughter; after a while the hysterics died down.

"I still have no idea." Rin started laughing again, only stopping when a demon came into his sight. A coal tar, drifting along. When it came to the borders of the city, it just kept drifting on, through the barrier. "What?" At that moment, Rin was just as perplexed as Kuro; but it didn't take long for his training to kick in and allow him to analyse the situation.

"It must be too low level to matter... Maybe... Hey Kuro, see if you can get through the barrier." Kuro looked a little taken back.

"Do you think I'm low level?"

"No, no, no. I was just thinking you should try... In case they just reinstated the old barrier." He was just thinking he needed a distraction for Kuro. Kuro wondered over to the barrier's limit to start cautiously pawing at it. Meanwhile, Rin sought out another coal tar. If one could get though, others could too. Soon, he was able to grab one out of the air.

"Hey there, it's your prince speaking." He whispered to the trapped demon, keeping his voice out of Kuro's senses. "I'm going to need another swarm."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, a lot has happened. I'm not entirely sure about this chapter's timing, plot and actually sense, but I'm going to blame this on a lack of sleep. Anyway, thanks for reading!


	14. Family Meeting

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why I have I gotten worse at writing. Shouldn't I be getting better? I swear I was funnier in my earlier chapters.

The exorcists were in discord. Then again, any memory of the demon invasion would have unnerved them, let alone another swarm.  Holy water grenades worked well enough to disperse and exorcise most of the coal tar, to be fair to them, they'd handled the situation pretty well considering their state; however they did make a mistake. With so many demons concentrated on one side, it wasn't hard to ignore the two demons that slipped in from the other side of the city.

Kuro guided Rin through the back alleys and small streets, familiar from his years in the city. Every so often, a patrol of exorcists would pass, or just the odd one running around in panic on their own, either way, the pair had to duck behind cover. Kuro was obviously nervous about being back in the city, but he still couldn't hide his excitement. After his treatment at the hands of this 'Shiro' guy, Rin would have thought there'd be at least a little resentment; but Kuro still seemed to like the guy. Just who was he? The smiling priest, or the horrified exorcist behind blue flames? Every time the question came to mind, Rin would walk a little faster, become a little more reckless. Kuro had to keep tugging him back before he ran out in front of exorcists, constantly earning an apology from Rin before he almost ran out in front of the next passing group.

"Which way?" Kuro tilted his head, but didn't give an answer. "Kuro?"

"I think he's close..."

"Kuro?"

"He's here!" Kuro was struggling to keep his voice hushed through his excitement. "We can get to him, we can..."

"Kuro, which way?" Rin cut him off.

"Rin?"

"Tell me." He was close, so close to learning so much more.

"Rin, aren't I going with y..."

"Come on, before he leaves I need to know!" Kuro was about to repeat his question but changed his mind at Rin's expression. He hadn't noticed it before. When did it become so dark, so delirious? "Kuro!"

"To the right..."

"Thanks," Rin straightened up, pausing just to turn to Kuro one last time. "You should get out of the city." Without another word, he left, leaving Kuro behind, alone in the alley.

"Rin?"

It didn't take much effort to get up onto  a roof, from there he looked down every street, ignoring the strange, panicked looks from those below. It was only a glimpse of white hair, but at the first sign of his target Rin let himself drop into the street.

* * *

Fujimoto was trying to keep calm, to keep composed, but there was one thing he hadn't expected, one thing that caused him to unravel.

"Hey, Old man!" Was that... Was that Rin? He froze in his tracks. "Hey, Fujimoto!" He turned around slowly. After Yukio's report, after Rin had... After the son of Satan invaded the city, Yukio told him about his encounter.

Fujimoto turned around slowly, finding himself face to face with Rin.

He'd been told Rin remembered nothing. _Nothing._ Then how did he know his name?

"Rin..." He couldn't help himself, the name slipped out. It was a small reaction, but it was there, Rin's eyes widened, just a little, in shock before he was closing the distance between the two.

"You do know me!" Fujimoto had wanted to see Rin for so long, he'd wanted to see him laugh, see him smile; but this was nothing like he remembered. A mad smile, spreading across his face. "YOU KNOW ME!"

Fujimoto couldn't make himself move. He couldn't make himself move as Rin grabbed his collar. He couldn't move as Rin shook him so violently he thought he'd break. He couldn't move as he wanted to embrace his adopted son again. He couldn't do anything.

"Why are you just standing there? What do you know?" His desperation was evident in his voice. He was so clueless, so furious. "Why won't you say anything?" The shaking was slowly subsiding. "Why don't I..."

Finally, Fujimoto stepped forwards, wrapping his arms around Rin.

"I'm sorry, I couldn't save you."

Rin froze in place. This was not something he'd expected, the old priest was practically crying on his shoulder. Wasn't he meant to be an exorcist. Rin did consider momentarily whether the guy thought he was possessing a body or something, but quickly dismissed it. He moved to push the man away, but couldn't bring himself to. It just felt so... Familiar. Just how long had he been in Assiah. By the time the third name came to mind, tears he couldn't explain were running down his face.

"Who's Yukio?"

* * *

The swarm of coal tar had torn through the barriers, with other small demons making their way through, all exorcists were on alert, and Yukio was no exception.  He couldn't remember how many times he'd emptied his clips, just as everything was starting to blur, his phone vibrated.

To be brief, Yukio was surprised. He hadn't expected a message from Fujimoto in the middle of the city's second invasion, and he hadn't expected it to tell him to come to a small, unused back street. It was needless to say he hadn't expected to find his adoptive father and his 'long-lost' twin sitting awkwardly in the before mentioned street waiting for him. The only thing he didn't find surprising was his inbuilt instinct to shoot the threat before him; only the warning glance from Fujimoto combined with the lack of context stopped him from doing so.

"Yukio, sit."

"I'll stand, thank you." Yukio tried to readjust his glasses in an attempt to regain composure, trying his best to keep his eyes away from his brother.

"Hey, Glasses, Remember what?" Admittedly, it was hard for him to keep his eyes from straying. Rin was more dishevelled than before, his eyes wild. "You were there too, weren't you. Hiding behind him..." Rin gestured towards Fujimoto. Yukio looked to Fujimoto seeking some kind of explanation, but he looked just as confused as Yukio was. Yukio thought he should have been fighting him, at least trying to capture him; but instead he was just standing there looking blankly at Rin.

Rin cocked his head, as if trying to see something that wasn't there.

"You would have been younger, 8 maybe, do you remember?" Rin chuckled looking back down. "Now I'm the only one that remembers, isn't that funny." His smile stretched wide enough to be a grimace, his eyes wide as he stared down at the floor.

Then it clicked. Yukio knew what Rin was talking about.

"Why don't I know you? Why are you so important? Why does my head hurt?" Yukio shook his head, but didn't look away from Rin. Looking at his brother's face, his brother's arms clutching at his head... But it wasn't his brother anymore, this demon had killed hundreds, and would kill hundreds more if left alone, all wearing his brother's face. He couldn't let that happen.

"I can make the pain stop." Rin stopped and looked up to Yukio, tears running down his face. This was his only chance. This was what was right. He raised his gun to Rin's head. "Just go to sleep."

He faintly remembered Fujimoto calling out his name as he pulled the trigger, but he paid it no mind. He just looked into the demons blue eyes, far too much like his brother's.

* * *

He would have been embarrassed if he wasn't preoccupied, instead he was just irritated. Yukio was starting to understand how Rin had felt after all the lectures he'd been getting from Fujimoto. It was understandable. Fujimoto had never gotten over losing Rin, he'd blamed himself for not being faster, for not being there. It wasn't surprising how he'd treated Yukio after the incident. He still considered him his son, but there was concern on his face, clear as day. Yukio on the other hand was cold, indifferent to the reactions he'd gotten.

He'd been sitting down for some time, considering what he'd done, what he'd do next. New ammunition and weapons had been made in mass after the last two invasions, there was even funding into a next generation of weaponry. It wasn't surprising, after all, Rin was still on the loose.

* * *

The weight of his gun alone should have been an indication, but his emotions had gotten the better of him. The clip was empty. Rin... The demon had looked him in the eye as the empty gun clicked; and then he'd scampered away, his eyes wide and fearful, like some wild animal. Yukio mechanically reloaded, shrugging of Fujimoto as he bolted over to stop his adopted son. He was shouting at him, but it sounded distant, it didn't matter at the time, his target was in front of him. He aimed at Rin, who was obviously too distressed to properly defend himself. Whatever was happening to him was causing him turmoil. He raised his gun to fire, his expression cold.

"Just stay still." He fired once, twice, the shots off mark from Fujimoto's attempts. Rin was still scrambling away, only one shot hit him, clean through the shoulder. If Rin was anywhere trapped inside _that,_ he'd hope to give him a clean death. That didn't seem to be an option anymore. The background shouting from Fujimoto died down, distracting Yukio's attention.

"Kuro." A demon had appeared at Rin's side, growling at the two exorcists. Rin called out to it, but Yukio's mind had simply processed it as another target, he had no room for error. Another two shots, one was dodged by the new demon, the other blocked with Rin's own body. Seeing him stand protectively in front of the other demon almost reminded him of his brother, but that wasn't enough to stop him. Seeing the glint in Yukio's eyes, Fujimoto couldn't afford to hold back. He disarmed him, flinching at Yukio's cry of pain before turning to Rin. He was almost out of sight, half dragged, half carried away by Kuro.

Once again, Fujimoto couldn't do anything as his son was taken away. He could only call out his name.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried. I last updated like two months ago, I'm so sorry! I've been in a bit of a motivation slump recently... Anyway, I hope this was worth the wait, I'd really like to improve my writing so any comments are appreciated. Thanks for reading!


	15. Dwindling Humanity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'M BACK and feeling guilty. I am so sorry for the lapse in work! I definitely need to finish this, but I should probably apologize in advance. My writing skills were pretty shaky to begin with, but I haven't watched or read Ao no Exorcist for a while, so I'm a little worried that the pretty OOC-ness is even worse now. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this very late chapter.

Everything was feeling distant for Rin. The shouting seemed far off. The pain was detached, a dull throb. But a name rattled loud and clear in his head.

"Yukio?" He wasn't aware he'd said anything out loud until Kuro's face shot into his vision, the small demon calling out his name at the first sign of consciousness. "Kuro?" Rin wasn't sure when he'd opened his eyes, he didn't know when the city's alleys and towering buildings were replaced with trees and stars. As soon as he heard his name, Kuro started to buzz with excitement, fuelled by relief; but his face still betrayed a tinge of concern that stained his expression.

"Rin! Are you okay? I couldn't see if you were hurt! We're far away from the city now. You wouldn't move, you wouldn't... But you're fine now, right?" Kuro's words spilled from his mouth and he was helpless to stop them. Rin smiled softly at the other's display and reached out a hand to rub Kuro's head.

"I'm fine now," Rin lied. "Just a little dizzy." The smaller demon's face lit up.

"I helped, didn't I?" He asked excitedly.

"Of course, I wouldn't have made it without you." This time Rin told Kuro the truth. From what he knew, which was very little, he'd just zoned out. It went against his instincts, his teachings, his innate knowledge as a demon. He was in enemy territory and he froze. That was the kind of mistake that'd cost him his life, and it almost did. It was thanks to Kuro that he was saved...  Kuro and the old man.

There was no point in denying it, that old man, that Fujimoto, was definitely... Sentimental. There was a connection there, even if it was tattered and torn, neglected and forgotten by Rin, Fujimoto was keeping it alive. He remembered something Rin didn't, and Rin wanted to know what that was. Judging from the old man's reaction, he would have expected Glasses to act the same way. Sure they'd fought and Rin  _may_ have tried to kill him a little, but there was some kind of history behind those cold eyes. Surely, there had to be.

Shaking his head to escape the intrusive thoughts, he stood up slowly only to stumble from head rush. When he stood up he realised the full extent of his wounds, and Kuro's. Ignoring the protesting sting his shoulder as he straightened, he focused on the wound of the smaller demon.

"Kuro! You're hurt?" Rin panicked at the sight of the wound on the other although it was rapidly healing, it was after all from an exorcist's gun; he could only guess what harmful, anti-demon ingredients it was packed with. Kuro tried to down play it and bring attention back to Rin's shoulder; but Rin didn't fall for any of the distractions the other offered. "I'm sorry Kuro, it's my fault this happened." He felt a small twist in his guts as he said those words, remembering the sense of superiority his father had tried to install in him; but the guilt at what he'd dragged his friend into, his first and only friend, the only one who stayed by him not knowing or caring that he was the prince of hell... That guilt overwhelmed his other emotions. He couldn't show any signs of weakness, downright refused to, but as he chased away the tears Kuro had already started rubbing against his legs. He couldn't have forgiven him already... He'd blindly followed Rin, trusting the other to keep him safe... Rin couldn't understand why Kuro would ignore that, and trust him again.

"It wasn't your fault." He told Rin, forcing his tone to take on a lighter quality, too cheery for the grim mood that had settled around Rin. "You said I needed to run, I came back on my own!"

"But I dragged you into this mess!"

"I was happy to follow you!"

"You have no idea what was in that bullet! You could be poisoned or..."

"It was my choice!" The usually small voice was filled with determination, unwilling to brake it's resolve. "I knew I could die but I came anyway!"

"You don't need to die for me! You're not one of my subjects, you're not one of my soldiers... You're my friend..." Rin froze after he'd let the words slip out of his mouth. He'd been too flustered, too concerned, too careless.

"Subjects...? Soldiers...?" Kuro echoed, confused. "H-Hey Rin... What do you mean?" The steely tone in Kuro's voice had left, leaving vulnerability in it's wake. Rin could see the understanding dawning in his eyes, but Kuro continued to speak fruitlessly in disbelief. "You don't mean... You can't be..."

"I'm sorry, Kuro."

"No, not you... You're... You can't be..." Kuro, backed away. Whether to get a clearer look at the other or to create some distance between them, Rin couldn't tell. "Everything you were doing here! You're Shiro's son!" Rin, to say the least, had expected a different answer. He couldn't help his baffled response.

"WHAT?" He spluttered, looking down to the smaller demon.

"Shiro told me about you! Before I was kicked out!"

"No no no, wait! I'm the son of Satan, _Satan_ , not that old man!" Rin corrected, forgetting in previous nervousness in the face of the new misunderstanding.

"I think you're confused."

"You're the only confused one around here!" Rin tried to recall everything Fujimoto had said before, he was a familiar presence, sure; but father? Definitely not. For one thing he was a human, an exorcist to boot. As Rin let himself ramble within his own thoughts, Kuro regarded him with a great measure of confusion and admiration.

"Of course you are his son! He talked about you all the time!" Kuro nodded as if having solved one of life's great mysteries. "He always brought up the name Rin, but I didn't think it was you... You said you were only a demon!"

"No, I  _am_ a demon..." It was then that something clicked in Rin's mind, allowing him to approach the situation rationally. The other was hardly a higher demon, but he wasn't dumb, especially not to make that big of a mistake. If there was any truth in what he was saying, Rin wanted to know it. Even if he was mistaken, there was always the chance it could resurface a few memories. "Say Kuro, what did he mention about me?"

"Well, you lived with him at the monastery with your brother, then you went missing, although he wouldn't tell me much about that..." Kuro continued on rambling, listing all of the most trivial, simple, useless details; details unimportant to Rin.

"I mean, what did he say about being my father."

"Well... You two weren't his sons, but he was definitely your father!" Ignoring how little sense Kuro was making, Rin let him carry on. "He found you guys, he raised you even when he wasn't meant to, he was a very good father." The cat sidhe, who had been looking increasingly proud, faltered; as if he had just remembered what his _Shiro_ had done to him. It was when he was about to start speaking again on the praises of Fujimoto's fathering skills that the ground started trembling. As if the Earth had something to fear. Both Kuro and Rin were quite literally shaken out of their conversation as unnatural rifts and cracks tore through the landscape, and the painfully familiar shape of a portal rose from the depths of the world. Gehenna gates never opened for good reason. Definitely not for humans, and very rarely for demons.

Rin could only wonder how many centuries he'd be grounded for.

* * *

 "Yukio... Yukio won't you listen to me?" With a nonchalance unbecoming of the star pupil and teacher, Yukio met Fujimoto's concerned eyes. "Yukio, don't you know what you've done?"

"I know perfectly well, how about we consider what you've done?" Yukio replied coldly to his adopted father. "You neglected your responsibilities as an exorcist, you spoke with the enemy, you stood with the enemy, you protected the enemy, and you allowed them to escape."

"Yukio he's your  _brother._ "

"No, demons killed my brother."

"Yukio, stop."

"That _thing_ is parading around in Rin's body. Everyone believes it's my brother doing those things but it's _not_. That's not my brother, and that's not your son. Now if you excuse me..."

"No." Fujimoto blocked Yukio's path to the door. "You're reckless, irresponsible, destructive... If you think I'm letting you go back out there..."

"I don't need you to let me do anything, you're not my commanding officer, you're not even an exorcist anymore." Yukio muttered, giving the other one of the more common of his responses, Fujimoto replied with his own, the exasperated sigh.

"I know Yukio, I know. But it doesn't mean you go out there. Even if you're the one telling the truth, even if... Even if Rin isn't with us anymore, that's no reason to let your life got to waste too." He was calm, tired almost, Yukio would have preferred him to be angry, that at least could have fuelled his rage, the near hopelessness in Fujimoto's voice was almost enough to make him cave in on it's own. "You need to be more level-headed, Yukio. You could get into trouble if you continue like this..."

"I'm just doing what's right!"

"Even with the right intentions, using the wrong ends to get there will make it meaningless." The old man sighed. "We hardly know anything, whether Rin is still inside there fighting, whether he's in pain, or whether he's just a demon now... We just don't know."

"We have to do something." Yukio pleaded.

"Even when that something could be a mistake?"

"Even then." 

* * *

 "I'm disappointed in you." Satan's voice boomed in the dark room, the blue fires flaring in response.

"I apologize." Rin could only try his best to placate his father. Out of the Gehenna gate had poured a small army of Palace guards, all under the orders of his father. Rin knew he could have taken them. Rin knew that'd have only made things worse. Rin let himself be dragged back home, leaving a terrified cat sidhe behind.

"That is not enough. Not this time."

"Father, I..."

"Listen." He hissed, the flames spluttering to barely flicker in the torches.  "Your curiosity has driven you too far, it has made you _weak_. It has made you everything you shouldn't be. I was wrong to leave it be. It must be extinguished, while you're still young. You cannot be the prince of hell like this, you cannot be my son." His father's words made chills run down Rin's spine, they left him in a cold sweat. Satan was not the most doting of fathers at the best of times, but if he was denounced... Rin didn't want to think about it. He briefly considered Amaimon's actions, he was curios in humans, but not in the same way as Rin. He considered what parts of a human to remove, he was curious about their carnal desires that had caused them to fall so low. He was not like Rin, and it made him wonder. He knew what Satan would do to make him his _perfect_ son, he would snuff out any flicker of humanity, anything with any connection to human emotions. He was too different from his brothers, although they held the spark of humanity, he indulged in it; and he could not help but wonder, how much of his humanity Satan would take away.

After his meeting with his father, he'd been guided back to his quarters. They were untouched, exactly as he had left them. He let himself slump onto the bed. His memories had been returning slowly, but not as he had wished them too. The few memories he'd been gifted when the white demon first helped him cover what he'd lost were still all he had; the only difference was that he could remember them in more detail. The exact vibrant hues of the blue flames as they shifted, the horrified expression twisting a young boys face, and the fear that stained the faces of the exorcists around him. All of that he remembered in vivid detail. But the rest of his memories? They kept themselves hidden, retreating to the darkest corners of his mind when he reached for them. At that moment, it was all he could do to let himself sleep and shrug of the burden of his future, his father and his own mind.

Unfortunately for Rin, his own mind was harder to escape, especially in sleep. He was plagued with thoughts of Kuro, Fujimoto and Yukio throughout his fitful sleep; he thought he wouldn't get a second of rest until he found himself standing at the gates of a monastery in a dreamlike state.

"It's not real." Rin told himself, finding the edges of the environment blurred and out of focus; the only area with any clarity being the building in front of him. deciding he had nothing to fear, and appreciating the distraction, pressed one hand against the gates with force to open them. Although the gate burst open, Rin pulled his hand back immediately, hissing with very real pain. Looking at his hand he saw burns in steaks, fitting the shape of the metal bars of the gate. "Anti-demon properties?" Not the usual monastery then. Slipping inside, avoiding contact with the metal on either side of him, he strolled up to the doors of the buildings, faking a confidence he didn't possess.

Inside there were people hurrying about, people he recognised although he could not place names to them. Directing them was Fujimoto. He stepped closer to the old man tentatively, he looked younger than when they'd met in the narrow alley way; he seemed less troubled, missing a few wrinkles.

"Ah, Rin. Get over here!" He called. Rin froze, 'this was just a dream' he reminded himself in the hopes that he might believe his own words. Suddenly he felt a strange sensation in his stomach as a kid ran through him, he looked down to see his body had dissipated like smoke, and was only just reforming to look as real as it had before. The kid continued on as if he hadn't just rudely marched _through_ another person and clung to Fujimoto in an excited variation of a hug. The child was so small, he could only just reach the old man's waist, but he boasted a mop of dark, messy hair, bright blue eyes, and a confidence far exceeding his height. It came to Rin with a shock that he was looking at himself. Just when did he look so... So human? When he heard another pair of running footstep behind him Rin dodged to the side, unwilling to be rendered to smoke again, only to find another child run past to embrace the old man. This one had lighter hair of mousy brown and slightly paler, calmer eyes. All in all he was very different to the first, especially with his moles and glasses; but he was very similar to someone else he knew. The Fujimoto in the dream confirmed it for him.

"You too, Yukio? Look how big you've both grown!" The small Rin beamed while Yukio offered a shyer smile.

"Well of course!" His child self spoke up, releasing the old man to sling an arm around Yukio's shoulders. "It's because of my cooking!" He declared with a baseless assurance.

"Naturally." Fujimoto replied. "Always looking out for Yukio, aren't you?" He asked almost jokingly.

"We _are_ brothers!" The small Rin replied in all seriousness.

The dream started to fade out, the voices becoming muted, the surroundings becoming blurred.

"Wait, brother?" Rin called, surging forwards. For all his speed, the trio in front of him kept receding, moving out of his reach until they were gone altogether. "WAIT, STOP!" It was useless, but Rin didn't stop struggling, even when he woke up.

He opened his eyes in a panic, bolting up to a sitting position to try and regain some semblance of composure and calm his breathing. After a moment, when he'd settled down enough, he sensed a presence to his side and whipped his head around to face it. To the right of his bed stood Dumas. Constantly shifting, almost shapeless, Dumas.

"My brother!" Rin gasped. "He's my brother!" He didn't know how to convey his urgency as he attempted to leave his bed. The memories were flooding back to suddenly, and Rin's knees were becoming weak with the mental strain, close to buckling. Despite his desperation to stand and move, Dumas remained entirely still.

"I'm sorry, my Lord; but I am under orders."

"Sorry? What do you...?" Rin didn't get to finish speaking, right in front of his eyes, Dumas dispersed, scattering the particles that formed it's shape. "Wait a second!" The smoke that used to be Dumas gathered and seethed like a hive of insects and he swarmed around Dumas. Reluctant to use his flames and actually kill the older demon, Rin swatted at the other, his nails sharpening into claws as he became more and more desperate. He felt the smoke pour into him, effectively stopping his breathing as it smothered him. With a metallic taste in his mouth and a sickening pounding in his head, he heard a whisper in his ear just before he passed out.

"You're still too human." 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... This happened. Again, I am so sorry and I hope this actually turned out okay! Anyway, thanks for reading!


	16. Back Again

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is just a small sort of in-between chapter, but I really wanted to post something today. It's been a year now since I made this horrible mistake of a fanfic. Thanks to all the people who've been reading it for so long!

There are some things humans take for granted. Joy, happiness, love, compassion, negativity, pain. That which they call humanity. They think that when they lose their 'humanity' they'll become nothing more than feral animals, uncivilized beasts. Most people believe that morals lie within humanity, the sense of right and wrong that they believed in. that they believed allowed them precedence over all other animals.

Demons could feel as much as humans, and sometimes even more. But what they lacked was control. Without reason all that was left was desire, demons simply felt too much. Be it the need to protect, the need to be loved, the need to destroy; it would consume them.

Rin had always held that overwhelming push that let him to go further than he should have. He would pour his heart into something again and again before ultimately changing interests. His fickle obsessions had lasted through his childhood and leaked into his life when the times before had been forgotten.

That small fragment of his mind that allowed him to influence his own behaviour was being slowly corrupted. And it was no easy process. It was strange, trapped in the Gehenna gate. He felt like he was suffocating, his lungs were pained with a weight that didn't belong in his chest . The mild differences of temperature he'd remembered from the times he'd entered the gate were replaced by the burning sensations of the extremes of hot and cold. Rin couldn't breathe but he didn't seem to need to. What Rin needed the most at that time was too escape.

* * *

Rin decided it was becoming a little too routine for him to wake up in a pure white expanse. Nothingness was becoming a familiar sight.

"That's strange." Although it felt as if all of his energy was slowly ebbing from his limbs, Rin numbly turned his head to the voice.  "You gained something, only to lose something more important. What sort of exchange have you made, Rin?" It was the white demon.

"I don't know what you're talking about." Rin stated blankly, his voice sounded off, bored even. He didn't care about that though, he just wanted to lay down for a while.

"I suppose you haven't quite _lost_ it yet. But it's certainly out of reach for you now." The other's voice was soft and calm although it held a hint of amusement, but it seemed far too loud for Rin's ears.

"You're giving me a headache, could you just leave?"

"I believe you already had that headache when you arrived."

"Leave." The white demon sighed.

"As much as I pity you in your current state, we're still in my domain. I _can't_ leave."

"How about just moving a couple of meters away?"

And they say it's always humour that's first to go." Rin would have glared if he had the energy, instead he just let his head roll to face above him again. He wasn't sure if he was looking at anything in particular, or just staring into blank space; but it was a hell of a lot easier than looking at the other.

"Then just send me away, you've done it before."

"Of course I could do that, but I'm not quite ready to be responsible for your state if you return."

"It's not your problem to begin with." All this talking was hurting Rin's head, he didn't want to deal with it.

"I'm afraid I'm already involved, I took you out of that mess. I can't let you go back."

"What mess?" As much as he loathed it, Rin was curious. The other demon laughed softly. "What?" Rin asked, indignant.

"Can't you see the humour in that?" He teased. "Forgetting again?"

"Shut up." Curiosity wasn't enough to keep him listening for any longer, ignoring the pounding in his head, Rin stumbled to his feet.

"Leaving, are we? How do you intend to do that?"

"Shut up." Rin pretended not to see the smile on the white demon's face as he walked away. Unsure of what he was standing on or where he was going, Rin walked on aimlessly. His mind as empty as the space he was walking in, he really didn't know what to expect; he wasn't surprised however to find himself walking past the white demon again.

"It's a small world after all." The elder commented, Rin kept walking. He didn't know how long he'd been going when he passed the white demon again, but he could have sworn that he hadn't walked as far.

"Remembered yet?" Rin kept walking. "Throwing a tantrum? I suppose you are still young." Rin kept walking, "You know it's rude to ignore someone that's talking to you."

The cycle continued on and on. Rin's scowl getting a little larger each time he passed. He had thought correctly, the intervals between the meetings was getting shorter; it had gotten to the point that barely a few seconds would pass before he'd see him again. If he tried to stop walking and the end the cycle, he'd find himself drifting backwards, a disconcerting sensation. It must have been the 30th time Rin had made his loop around when he finally came to a halt right in front of the white demon.

"I suppose you've come to some kind of decision?"

"Tell me." Rin asked him, his voice still indifferent despite his scowl.

"I'm afraid you're going to have to elaborate."

 "How do I get out of here?" The hidden imperative was clear, it was hardly hidden. Although it was a question he spoke it like a command.

"This isn't good. Do not tell me you've become fixated on escaping..."

"Tell me."

"Rin, focus on your memories, don't let him..."

"Tell me!" The white demon paused.

"You really won't be dissuaded... Fine. I release you." Once the sentence was finished Rin woke up in his quarters. He wanted to leave. He needed to leave. Rin scrambled out of his bed, looking around the room wildly before rushing to the door, there was only one thought in his mind. He swung open the door only to hear the wood crack and splinter around the hinges. He'd definitely used too much force, but that didn't matter. Rin stepped out into the corridor and he started running.

He ran until he reached a balcony, his legs were still weak from the stress of the gate and the nauseating feeling in his stomach made him sway, but he couldn't let that stop him. Rin held out his hand and dragged one of his nails along the open palm, wincing at the blood that welled along the thin line. He clenched his hand to let the blood pool before letting it drip to the ground. The blood of Satan would open the Gehenna gate, and he'd never been closer to sharing that blood than in that instant.   

The stone of the balcony churned and bubbled into a Gehenna gate.

_Focus on your memories_

He could have laughed at those words, it'd been all he was doing. He just needed a little more time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He's getting even more OOC... I'm going to be making him a little more like the Rin we know soon so stick with me. Anyway, thanks for reading.


	17. The Monastery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Haha that feeling when you spent ages rewriting all the earlier chapters of a fic then lose all the work you'd done setting you back months. Classic.  
> I'm honestly dead inside I can't believe that happened I spent so long rewriting that stuff.

He had only one destination in mind as he climbed out of the Gehenna gate. The monastery. He didn't have much to go on though. He was running through streets on pure instinct alone, taking turns when he felt like it and running until his legs ached and his feet hurt. He was about to take a break and slump against the nearest surface he could find when a sudden compulsion urged him to continue and push his tired limbs further. Ignoring his complaining limbs he charged on, and in a few more minutes he found himself outside of heavy, metal gates.

He'd arrived. It was the monastery.

Rin tentatively reached out a hand to the gate. At the slightest touch the metal seared his hand, forcing him to flinch back. He brought his hand up to his face and watched the damaged skin knit back together and heal. The cautious approach wasn't going to work. With more force, he thrust out his hand, ignoring the stinging sensation to force the gates to crumple under the force, allowing him to pass through into the grounds. The wards in place there may have been strong, but they weren't enough to keep a high level demon out for long.

He took a deep breath before stepping into the holy ground, ignoring the tingling sensation as he broke through the invisible barrier. Rin's sensitive hearing picked up the panic inside the monastery almost instantly, the clattering of priests reaching for weapons unmistakable. He didn't hesitate in marching to the doors of the monastery, one push blowing them open and almost detaching them from their hinges.  He was only a few steps inside when priests burst into the main room, guns blazing as soon as they identified their target. Before any of the bullets were able to reach Rin, a wall of blue flames rose to shield him from the barrage.

Names flooded into Rin's mind as he regarded the exorcists in front of him.

_Nagatomo, Reiji, Gorou..._

He knew these people. No, he'd _known_ these people. That time was long in the past.

With the flames protecting him, Rin walked towards the exorcists then straight past them. They were unsurprisingly confused as he continued on without as much as a passing remark but he paid them no mind, his feet carrying down once familiar corridors. Soon he found himself outside a plain looking door. He gulped nervously before entering even though there wasn't anyone or anything that could threaten him in the monastery.

Behind the door was a simple, sparse room. Two beds parallel to each other at one side of the room along with a few other pieces of furniture. One for him and one for... For once, he didn't want to think about it. There was dust collecting on the furniture and floating lazily in the air, disturbed by his entry. The room seemly lonely somehow, neglected despite the large staff of priests that cared for the building. He took a few steps into the room before slumming onto the bed that used to be his. Rin's eyes darted around the room despite his resigned looking state, chasing memories and the ghosts of the past. His senses seemed too sharp, picking up on the slightest movements inside and outside the room. His breathing, even his own heart beat, sounded far too loud.

He could hear the exorcist's indecisiveness as they hesitated in chasing after him, conflicted between their duty and their memories their stress could only be exacerbated by facing an enemy far stronger than themselves. He knew they'd call for backup and soon hundreds of exorcists would pour into the monastery, but he couldn't bring himself to move. He just wanted to sit down for a while. To just sit down and think.

He knew he needed to get his thoughts in order and fast. He needed to know what to do next. He'd returned to Assiah on a whim. He'd come to the monastery on instinct. Essentially, he had no plan, no direction, and no-one he could trust to help him.

The humans that had been so familiar to him as a child were against him now. They wanted to catch him, kill him. The demons he'd grown up with had stolen him, deceived him; they wanted him back in Gehenna, trapped and used as a weapon against people that didn't deserve it.

It was a lose, lose situation.

But that wasn't the only conflict he was faced with. His morals were in turmoil, causing him to switch between crippling guilt and complete apathy over his actions. His two natures fighting were for dominance. And Rin didn't know which one would win.

"Rin?" A gentle voice called him out. His head snapped up to find the speaker immediately. It was Fujimoto. He approached Rin slowly, as hesitant as if he was walking towards a wild animal that was about to flee.

"Old man?" Something changed in Fujimoto's eyes the second Rin used the familiar address. The exorcist wetted his lips nervously about to speak again when Rin suddenly cut him off. "I'm sorry." Fujimoto was taken aback, Rin's words were laced with regret and heavy with emotion. "I'm sorry for fighting again, I'm sorry for killing... For killing all those men," Rin's voice was breaking as he took deep shuddering breaths, sniffing as he tried to fight back the unshed tears in his eyes.

"Rin..." Before Rin had the chance to speak again Fujimoto had already stepped forwards to embrace his adoptive son in a crushing hug.

It was Rin. It was truly Rin.

"You remember? You remember, don't you?" Fujimoto asked softly, feeling Rin nod against in shoulder in reply. He was being sentimental again, but none of the other priests could blame him; he'd needed this to happen for so long. Too long. But he knew sentimentality wasn't what he needed this time. For once, just once, he wanted to be able to protect Rin, and as long as he stayed here he wasn't safe. Not from the exorcists, not from Yukio. Gently, he pulled away from Rin, supporting the other with firm hands on his shoulders, unwilling to entirely cut contact with his adoptive son so soon.

"Rin, you know you can't stay here." Rin's eyes, which had previously been fixed on the floor, flashed up to meet Fujimoto's; panic seeping into his expression, "You're in danger here, we have to move you."

"I need to tell Yukio... I need to tell him..."

"Yukio won't listen," Fujimoto interrupted, wincing when he realised how harsh he sounded, "he won't understand it's you."

The pain in Rin's expression was clear as day causing a tang of guilt for Fujimoto.

"We can find somewhere for you to go, we can get you away, you can hide..." Fujimoto scrambled to think of a place for Rin; as he was he could be mistaken for a human. His tail, ears and teeth being the only indicators while he wasn't summoning the blue flames. As long as he hid his tail he'd simply look a little odd to the casual passer by.

"I know a place." Fujimoto was snapped out of his thoughts by the determination in Rin's voice. "I just need your help."

* * *

In Satan's opinion, far too many people had been disrupting his plans for far too long, especially his sons. The youngest of which was proving more troubling than most. He was practically infantile for a demon even though his body had matured quickly and yet he was already proving disobedient.

The latest of his problems had come in the form of said youngest son's escape from Gehenna after he'd spent the effort to rid him of his humanity, It was insulting. And Satan... Satan didn't take insults lightly.

He stormed down the dimly lit corridors with a rarely seen spark in his electric blue eyes, his black robes flailing behind him in his fast pace. He had a destination in mind, a glorified store room for high class weapons.

He flung open the door to the armoury and the torches inside were set ablaze with blue light as if in welcoming. He ignored various cursed swords, bows and maces as he walked through the room. They were impressive specimens no doubt, but they were not his target. Then, the glimmer of blue caught his attention. Finally, he'd found it.

He lifted the sword from his stand with a level of caution unbecoming of the lord of Gehenna to hold it up in front of him.

Kurikara wasn't his sword, but that didn't mean he didn't know exactly how best to use it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the lack of updates... It's been a while. I was working on rewriting the chapters for ages and lost all my progress. I've started that process again but now I'm updating the chapters as I write them now (the first 3 chapters are written and are a combination of 3 chapters each) so it'll be a little mismatched but I decided to get this chapter out before I leave for a month long project in another country.  
> Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter even though it was a little short, as always, thanks for reading!


	18. Forest Run

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> turns up like 4 months late with starbucks

When Rin and Fujimoto left the monastery, they left alone. It was a journey Rin couldn't make on his own, but not one he was willing to involve too many innocent people in. Shiro had tried to counter him by reassuring him that everyone in the monastery was an exorcist, but Rin felt responsible for far too much damage already. Fujimoto had made sure to supply himself fully before heading out; extra bullets, holy water grenades, and two bentos all neatly packed away. He could see the conflict on the other priest's faces as they left, some were obviously sad to see Rin go, others held their reservations over him, but they all agreed not to speak a word to the Vatican. Fujimoto trusted them without a shadow of a doubt, and that was just enough to convince Rin their secret was safe before they left.

On the road they were mostly silent. Neither wanted to bring up the events of the last 7 years, it was too painful to think of the things that had gone wrong. When Rin stumbled, Fujimoto was there to help him recover, to encourage him to keep drinking water, to eat just a little food. He couldn't tell what his son had been through, but it was impossible not to see the exhaustion etched into the young boy's face. A bone deep tiredness that Shiro should have never let him experience at such an age. Although he knows there's nothing he could have done, that knowledge does nothing to ease the guilt. It's almost painful to walk besides Rin, the silence is unbearable, and the old quirks he notices that his son has kept from childhood even more so. Once they'd cleared the city however, he noticed that Rin seemed far more at ease; he was never entirely relaxed, only less tense.

"So, are you finally going to tell me where we're going?" Fujimoto asked, trying to keep his tone light. Rin seemed almost surprised when he talked but quickly recovered.

"It's a small village... I don't even know its name, but they know me there. I think... I think it's safe."

"Well... It's a start." It was more than Fujimoto had at least.

Rin had no idea whether they'd accept him a second time. True, they'd had no clue of who he was when he first left, but that didn't mean they'd be just as hospitable a second time. News travels fast, even to those distrustful of the Vatican. He didn't know if he deserved a quiet life; but he knew there were still things for him to do, in this world and Gehenna. He needed to find Kuro and he needed to repent for the crimes he'd committed. He needed to find a way to escape his father's grasp, and he needed a way stop his plans. He sighed out loud, ignoring the look it earned him from the old man, he had a lot on his plate.

* * *

Yukio felt guilty, while still convinced that his choices were correct he believed he may have been too harsh of Fujimoto. Rin needed to be dealt with, but the old man treated him like a human. He'd been out of touch with the Vatican too long; in short: he'd grown soft. Exorcists couldn't afford to be soft, he knew what letting a high level demon roam free could do. _He'd seen it._ He wasn't going to let it happen again either, he had to put an end to the son of Satan, even if it broke his father's heart.

However, despite the comfort of his ruthless logic he couldn't shake the guilt of causing Fujimoto to suffer. Of course, all the pain he was feeling was due to the demon parading around with Rin's face, but that knowledge did little to help. So naturally he decided a visit to the monastery was in order He knew something was wrong the instant he stood outside the gates. They were crumpled in, as if blown away by some incredible force. It _had_ to be a high level demon, and there was only one Yukio could think off that would target the monastery. Fearing the worst, Yukio drew his gun and stepped inside. What he saw was completely different to what he was expecting.

There were no burnt pews or charred bodies littering the monastery, instead he found the priests gathered at the dining table in the kitchen area looking subdued. As soon as they noticed Yukio though they shot up from their seats.

"What happened?" Yukio demanded, "Where's Fujimoto?" It was Nagatomo that spoke up first in the face of Yukio's anger.

"Uh, he's not here right now..."

"And the gates?"

"It was nothing we couldn't handle, if you're looking for Fujimoto he should be back soon, you're always welcome to..."

"Nothing you couldn't handle?" Yukio interrupted, "Was there a demon attack, have you reported it to the Vatican?" Nagatomo looked to the other priests nervously, gulping awkwardly before turning back to Yukio.

"Not yet, it was nothing big you don't need to worry..."

"Those gates couldn't have been brought down by anything so small; besides, you have to report any and all suspicious demon activity. Especially after... Especially after the attack on true cross city."

"Ah, well we're somewhat more separate from the Vatican recently, or at least the exorcist side of it," Nagatomo laughed nervously, "so we didn't know about the new order." He fell silent at Yukio's glare.

"What happened?" His voice had become cold, he knew they were hiding something.

"I swear..." Before Nagamoto could even fully start he was cut off by Yukio.

"Was _he_ here? Did you let him go?" He asked, incredulous.

"Yukio, wait!" Yukio stormed out just as the priests started calling him back in. They'd lied to him. They'd lied to him and Rin was back in Assiah. The second he reached a door with a lock he jammed in the key to Vatican and rushed through. There was one thing he was sure off: Rin wouldn't get away this time.

* * *

There'd been something gnawing at Rin for a while and it'd only been made worse by the tense atmosphere. It felt like anything could go wrong, and without the small, familiar presence by his side it all felt off kilter. He hadn't thought he'd been with Kuro long enough for such a strong connection to occur, but the gap he left didn't appear to be easily filled. Even with Fujimoto by his side. It felt like he barely knew the man, he almost more of a familiar stranger than family. Rin wanted so badly to connect him to the man of his memories but seeing old habits he'd kept over the years was painful; comparing what he had been before to what he'd become even more so.

They lapsed back into silence soon after Fujimoto had asked where they were going. Neither was quite sure whether that silence was comfortable or not, especially as the air grew thicker with tension by the second. Regardless of the awkward atmosphere, the thought of Kuro kept slipping into his mind. The cat sidhe had been left behind as Rin was forced to enter the portal; just after Kuro had told him that he was Shiro's son. Just after Rin had called him a friend. As much as Rin liked the silence, or rather the absence of questions, he couldn't help himself from voicing his thoughts.

"You know Kuro, don't you?" Fujimoto immediately stopped walking at the name causing Rin to also stop and turn around to face him. The old man took a moment to carefully choose his words under Rin's scrutiny.

"He was with you, before, in the ally," it was more of statement but Rid nodded in confirmation anyway, "Kuro was my familiar, and a friend." _A friend_. As soon as he heard those words a cold fury started to well up within Rin and even though he soon pushed that anger down, taking deep breaths to calm himself, he couldn't help but feel resentment. It took all his restraint not to ask why Fujimoto had left his friend in the dust. Why he'd left Kuro in the devastated state Rin had found him in. He knew it'd take a while to understand Fujimoto, to come to see him in a light even remotely close to what he used to. But it'd been made even more difficult as he found himself confronted with the man that was both his adoptive father, the priest that had guided him in his youth, and Shiro, the exorcist that had abandoned his friend on the command of the Vatican.

He was pulled from his thoughts by Fujimoto's exasperated sigh.

"I know what you're thinking... He was willing to protect you with his life, I wouldn't be surprised if he told you what happened. I didn't mean to..."

"Forget about it," Rin cut him off more harshly that he intended.

"Rin..."

"Forget about it!" It came out as a growl causing Fujimoto to visibly flinch and Rin regretted it as soon as the words left his mouth. "I'm sorry..." Anger seemed to come to him easily, far more easily than before. As did guilt.

"Don't worry about it!" Fujimoto replied instantly, faking a bright smile as he continued walking forwards again. An awkward silence fell between them as they continued walking; far too much and far too little between them for any conversation to last more than a few minutes. However uncomfortable those moments were, the pair found themselves thankful of the quiet as Rin heard the crush of footsteps and the barely audible clink of weapons. At once he swung out his arm to stop Fujimoto.

"There's someone coming."

"An exorcist?"

"I can't tell, they're too far away, but they're armed." Fujimoto cursed under his breath.

"The place we're heading," a bead of sweat rolled down Shiro's face, "is it far?"

"Far enough to be a problem... We'll need to move faster, and keep quiet. I need to be able to hear them. If it looks like they're going to catch us you'll need to run or fight against me... Anything to stop them taking you in with me."

"Rin, I'm not letting them get you," the 'again' was left unspoken.

"If they find me you won't have a choice, I'm not killing again. _Never again_. All I can do is run. If they attack you with me, there's a village to the west of us you can tell them you're with me. They should accept you, just don't mention you're an exorcist... Although it's a little obvious you're a priest..." Fujimoto listened to Rin as he rambled on quietly, his attention focused on 100 things at once. He couldn't help but feel a twinge of pride as his adoptive son laid down his plan, covering every detail he could think of. Suddenly, Rin stopped talking.

"I can hear more people, up ahead on that ridge," Rid whispered, signalling their location with a nod of his head. Just as they were about to sneak around the new obstacle, Rin paused again. "That voice. That's... That's Yukio." Fujimoto recognised the reckless look on Rin's face, it was the exact look he always had just before he'd rushed off into danger as a kid. It was that knowledge alone that allowed him to react on time to compete with Rin's superhuman reflexes as he charged forwards; only just hauled back by Fujimoto's grip on his shoulder.

"Rin, _you can't_." The broken look that flashed across Rin's face almost shattered Fujimoto's resolve; but the memory of Yukio's words the last time he saw him kept him from letting Rin go.

"I have to, _please._ " Rin remembered the last time he'd seen his brother in painful clarity, he hadn't understood last time. He didn't know what was going on. This time he did, and god did he hope he could get that across to Yukio. If he could reach him, even for a second...

Fujimoto's gaze was almost pitying, a for a second Rin hated it. As much as Rin hated pity, he knew the old man had been the one to talk to Yukio the most out of both them. The one with the best chance of knowing what Yukio was thinking. Rin shook himself out of his thoughts.

He couldn't afford to let himself to get distracted. If he messed this up then he would ruin things for Fujimoto, and he'd never see Kuro again. He could get captured by the Exorcists, or worse, his father.

"Sorry, let's keep going." Rin conceded, shrugging off Shiro's grip after the man had confirmed that his son wouldn't be running off, chasing the ghost of a relationship. If it came to a fight, the pair would be more than a challenge but Rin had made it clear. No killing. No more blood on his hands. So Fujimoto had to respect that; god help him if he became the cause of even more suffering in the poor boy's life, or anyone else's for that matter. Especially a fellow exorcist's. 

"So it's confirmed, they're exorcists," Fujimoto stated with no small amount of dread in his voice, "If we run into them, just what do you plan to do, Rin?"

"We run."

"And if they follow?"

"I... I have that covered. You just worry about yourself, don't forget the plan." Fujimoto wasn't forgetting it, just blatantly ignoring it. Just a moment later, Rin jerked to the side and a bullet whistled past Rin's ear, burrowing deep into the tree just in front of him. Just where his head had been a fraction of a second earlier.

* * *

"I have him in my sights, do I take the shot?" It was by sheer chance that the exorcist spotted two figures creeping through the trees; but the woman herself couldn't tell whether it was lucky or not to have been the one to first encounter the son of Satan.

"Shoot to kill," the command was icily cold and spoken without remorse. The exorcist gulped nervously before she lined up the shot; her target seemed distract, he had to have been to not have noticed her, so without further ado, she fired.

The crack of the gun echoed through the forest, attracting the attention of exorcists all over. At the last moment Rin had moved just out of the bullet's path, and from that one shot he instantly located her position. She felt a cold sweat rise as those electric blue eyes locked onto her only to turn away a second later. He was running.

"He's on the move," she reported in. A second later a command crackled through all channels directing an attack on the target's position.

Yukio heard the shot first and was momentarily stunned by the disruption of the forest's peace only to be shocked back into action by the muffled direction given through the com-link. _Rin_. He shot off in a second, drawing his gun and checking his ammunition as he ran. He was surprised by how close Rin's position was, right under his noise like the snake in the grass he was; there was one good thing about it though, it only took moments for him to catch a glimpse of Rin.

He couldn't tell why he was running, he had to have a plan; he'd seen the devastation those blue flames could cause, and there was no way a weapon so powerful could be challenged by a lone exorcist with a gun. Something was off, and Yukio was determined to find out what it was.

* * *

Rin couldn't figure out what was more disturbing. The fact that he'd been so caught up in listening out for Yukio that he completely missed another enemy, or the realisation that even though the bullet was less than a centimetre away from his head, his blue flames hadn't risen up to protect him. He knew using the flames properly in combat required a large amount of confidence and concentration, but the gunshot should have been enough warning for him to have raised a shield in time. To make matters worse he hadn't even considered raising a shield for Fujimoto too even though he was also a target, a fact that weighed heavily on his conscience.

He had no doubts that exorcists were converging on their location; soon they'd be overrun. Cornered. So he ran. He ran as if the devil was on his heels, which, Rin supposed, he was.

"We're leading them towards the village," Rin realised, "we've got to turn back!"

"What?" Fujimoto's tone was incredulous.

"I won't get them involved."

"We can't turn back!" Shiro protested despite already being sure the steely resolve in his son's voice was the real deal.

"I don't have a choice, go on without me, I'm their target."

"Rin, I can't..."

"GO!" It was too late, even as Rin shouted the command there were already exorcists surrounding them. Cutting off their exits. Rin wheeled around, scanning the company in front of him until he locked onto Yukio. We watched with eyes blown wide as Yukio manoeuvred through the growing crowd to reach the front.

"I have you now." It was all Yukio said before the scene fell into chaos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh god I'm so bad at this but it seems like a load of people are waiting on this chapter so I don't want to disappoint! I started this a long time ago, back before my writing style even started developing and it's still developing now so I'd like to thank everyone that's stuck with me on this fic even though it's a lil messed up. Thanks for reading!


	19. Out of the Frying Pan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welp, time to pour some gasoline on the flames.

Fujimoto, as much as he was set on protecting his son, he wasn’t prepared to murder his exorcists. He killed demons, sure, but not _humans._ He knew with their numbers he wouldn’t last a second if he didn’t fight back, but it’d also been obvious that he wasn’t going to make it out uncaptured the moment they faced off. The best hope he had was being a distraction, if he could just get Rin enough time to escape, that would be enough.

“Yukio! Call this off! Don’t cause any more bloodshed.” Fujimoto intercepted him, putting his own body between the brothers as half the exorcists charged past them after Rin and the rest circled around the old priest, eying him nervously.

“I’m not the one causing the bloodshed, now get out of my way!” Yukio tried to get around his adoptive father, hesitant to truly harm him. He’d lost enough family already. “You can’t protect him,” his voice dropped until it was barely above a whisper, “it’s not even Rin anymore.” Shiro grabbed Yukio by his shoulders, using all his strength to hold him in place.

“Yukio, you don’t know what you’re talking about, it’s still…”

“Stop it,” Yukio cut him off, throwing his arms up to lose Fujimoto’s grip. As soon as he was released, the exorcists that accompanied him advanced on Shiro and apprehended him. Yukio spared him one glance before he rushed off after Rin. The exorcists were rough handling him, but Rin had a head start. Not even one of the exorcists that had chased after him was capable of stopping him. Whether Yukio could, however, was another matter entirely.

* * *

 

Rin had made good progress running. He’d felt guilty over leaving Fujimoto behind so easily, but a moment of hesitation could have proved fatal. Besides, the man his adoptive father was seemed more like a dream or a distant memory than the man that had been beside him only a minute ago. It was hard to connect reality to his memories, and with every second that passed he remembered more and more of his childhood. Back came the memories of how he’d been isolated in his life in Assiah, and how he’d been forcefully taken from that life. With new memory that flooded into his thoughts his stance grew stronger. With his past put into perspective, it became obvious that his father didn’t care for him, that he was only a pawn in a greater game.

Despite his inhuman speed, the trees didn’t provide him with enough cover to escape the exorcists’ sights and they persistently kept on his trail. Occasionally one would summon a demon to send after him, but their power levels were far too low to be more than pests to him. All the same, they slowed him down. As he kept running it became more and more obvious that he was lost as he started throwing twists and turns into his path at random. It seemed as if the chase would continue forever when the ground started running.

All at once, Rin’s senses were bombarded with a mob of demons. They were low level earth kingdom demons, the kind you’d find lingering around the average forest, and they were all heading towards him, or rather, behind him. It took him a second to fully process what was happening.

“Amaimon?” There was no vocal answer, but a glance behind him revealed that the demons were opposing the exorcists that were pursuing him. It was good to see that not all his blood relations were after him. With a grin pulling at his lips he surged on.

The grin didn’t last long. Soon there were gunshots that rang out louder than others, and the sound of them was immediately familiar. He’d only encountered them a few times before, but one meeting at close range was one too many. It was Yukio.

He looked back and caught a glance of his twin, tearing through the demon ranks towards him, advancing with a speed Rin thought couldn’t be entirely human. He quickly turned his gaze back onto the path in front of him. If he tripped up now, it’d all be over. Despite that thought in mind, he almost stumbled only a moment later as a bullet whistled past his head, embedding itself in a tree to his right. He was only just able to avoid the shots aimed his way, but every time he dodged his speed waned and Yukio gained another couple of steps. Soon the distance between them was too short for Rin to be sure he could escape unscathed, soon a lucky shot would catch him and he’d be in the hands of exorcists. Seeing no other option, he stopped running and turned to face Yukio.

“I’m not going to let you take me too, Yukio.”

“I’m not planning on taking you, demon. I’m ending it here, _now.”_ He raised one of his guns to be level with Rin’s head, aiming right between his eyes.

“You don’t have to do this,” Yukio snorted at his words, “just let me go.”

“First you take my brother, then my father, and you just expect me to let you go?”

“I’m still your brother!”

“Shut up!” Before Yukio could say anything else he let out a howl of agony, his hand rushing up to cradle his head as his knees buckled and he crumpled to the floor. Then he burst into blue flames, his ears elongating as haunting laughter spilled out of his mouth, revealing too sharp teeth.

“Yukio?” Rin took a nervous step forwards.

“Whoops, looks like he got a little _too_ emotional.” It wasn’t Yukio’s voice speaking. It was almost identical to how he usually spoke and yet entirely difficult. “It doesn’t take much for this one to lose control of his emotions, does it my son?”

“Father?” Rin asked, his voice full of disbelief. The blue flames, the demonic features… It had to be a possession. Yet this wasn’t the father he knew, gone was the cold calculation was stoic front; this was a new, unseen side of him. Yukio, or rather Satan, stretched out his body with the audible sound of clicking bones.

“Now, you’ve had a nice run around. Time to come back home, hmm?” There was a cruel amusement in his voice.

“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO YUKIO?” Rin shouted in outrage.

“Why so _angry_ Rin? Yukio is my son too, _my property_.”

“RELEASE HIM!”

“And just what are you willing to pay for that to happen?” Rin froze in place, momentarily panicked before his resolve settled in. He slipped into a fighting stance; his legs crouched, to lower his centre of gravity, and his arms raised, to defend or attack. “You really think you can fight me? How pitiful!” Satan straightened up to his full height, despite being no taller than Rin in Yukio’s body, he seemed to tower over him. “Then again, I suppose you have been more trouble than you’re worth recently, especially since I have a replacement, and I had put so much energy into you,” he sighed.

“Replacement?” Rin asked, cold dread settling into his stomach.

“Of course, one twin is just as good as another, even if he doesn’t have the flames he’ll make a fine vessel.”

“Wait! YOU CAN’T!” Rin surged forwards.

“Oh Rin, you know that isn’t how this works.” With one, sudden jerk of his sharpened nails against his hand, Yukio’s blood splattered on the ground between the two. Rin stopped in his tracks, one more step and he would have walked straight into the Gehenna gate that had just opened in front of him.

“I’ll see you soon, my son.” With an entirely unnatural, manic smile plastered on his face, Satan sunk down into the dark abyss of writhing faces.

As soon as Yukio’s body was out of harm’s way, or at least as far from harm you could get considering he’d just been transported to hell, Rin summoned his flames and destroyed the portal before any demon spawn could escape into Assiah through it. However, even though the gate was destroyed, that wasn’t the end of his problems.

The fire Satan had summoned when he possessed Yukio had set the surrounding grass and trees ablaze and it was spreading through the forest fast. He doubted it’d take any time at all to reach the village, and he wasn’t about to let them die for the troubles he brought to them. First he tried controlling the fire, but the flames of his father burned brighter than his own, and were far harder for him to control. Sometimes he forgot how inexperienced and young he was for a demon, but now it was all too clear. When he tried to cut the fire off in one direction it spread in the other, as if intentionally stunting his progress. It soon became obvious that trying to isolate the flames from the outside was fruitless, he’d have to resort to different tactics. Sucking in his breath, he tentatively reached out his hand towards the flames, only releasing his breath when he confirmed he could stop the flames from hurting him.

Pushing down his trepidation over being burned alive, Rin stepped into the flames. It was hotter than he was used to, lacking the warm fuzzy feeling his own blue fire brought him, but he couldn’t let that dissuade him so he pushed on, right to the heart of the fire. Rin summoned as much power as he could muster and spread his arms wide, trying to grasp control of the flames. The more effort he put into it, the more his demonic features shone through. His horns of blue fire burst into life and his tail escaped from underneath his shirt where he’d had it wrapped it around his torso and hidden. Sweat was dripping down his forehead and all his muscles were tense and aching, but slowly and surely, the fire receded ebbing out and leaving thin wisps of smoke in their place. When all the fire was extinguished, he let himself relax and slumped forwards onto the scorched earth around him, panting and shaking.

He didn’t notice there was a crowd around him until it was too late.

“ _You?_ You’re the demon?” Rin didn’t know if it was better or worse that it was the villagers that found him and not the exorcists. On one hand, they weren’t going to imprison him on sight in his moment of weakness. On the other hand, he had to watch those once trustful faces become twisted with fear and distrust. From what he could gather, from both the frightened mutterings of the small group and the buckets of water in their hands, they’d come out to face the fire, or at least attempt to, and found him instead. He forced himself to his feet and took a step towards them. He wanted to explain himself, to make sure they knew he wasn’t a danger. At the movement, they all flinched, scuttling backwards. Away from him.

“I’m not going to hurt you; I was trying to…”

“STAY AWAY!” There was fear in their voices too, real, genuine fear. It was like a stab to the heart. The village wasn’t a safe space. Not anymore.

Rin took a step back, and then another. His heal caught on the charred remains of a fallen branch and he tripped backwards, landing painfully on the singed ground. He jumped back up quickly before turning away from the fearful gazes and pelting in the opposite direction.

He ran until his lungs were heaving and his legs could barely keep him standing, it was only when he was on the very verge of collapsing that he finally stopped to rest against a tree.

“Humans have always been fickle, brother. You shouldn’t take it to heart.” Rin jumped at the sudden voice, too tired to be fully aware of his surroundings.

“Amaimon!” He sighed in relief at the familiar face.

“You’ve got yourself into quite the bit of trouble,” he said absently, as if Rin had been sneaking out past curfew and wasn’t openly disobeying his father and lord’s orders.

“That’s one way to put it… Thank you, for earlier.”

“Don’t mention it, besides, that wasn’t what I came here to discuss,” Amaimon took a deep breath, “father is planning an invasion on Assiah.”

“What?”

“He’s planning a…”

“No, no, no. I got that bit. It’s just…”

“A shock?” Amaimon supplied.

“All things in consideration, no, not really. It’s just sudden.”

“I see, then what are you going to do next, I see father took your human brother.”

“And you didn’t help?” Rin asked, incredulous.

“Even if I had helped, do you think the outcome would have changed?” Rin looked away from Amaimon, he already knew the answer to that question.

“What happens next?”

“Well I suppose you could you into hiding, although it wouldn’t take long for father to find you once he invades.”

“I could warn the exorcists.” Rin suggests despite being fully aware they wouldn’t believe him let alone help him. “Wait, Amaimon, do you know where Kuro is?”

“That little cat sith you were with?” Rin nodded. “I believe they are wondering around True Cross City, waiting for you probably. I don’t see any other reason why they’d risk being around so many exorcists.”

“He’s my friend, I’ve got to find him.” Rin stepped away from the tree, relinquishing its support even though he swayed as he tried to stand. “Amaimon, if I fight against father, can I count on you?” It took one look at Rin’s face for Amaimon to make up his mind.

“I always did spoil you, didn’t I?”

“Is that a yes?”

“Rin, if you fight, I’ll stand with you.”

* * *

 

Shiemi had been worried when Yukio left without giving a reason, calling in a substitute teacher to cover their lessons. What had concerned her even more however was that he came to her mother’s shop to stock up on supplies for a mission, a heavy duty one at that judging by the amount and magnitude of what he bought. Yet he wouldn’t tell her about the mission, not one word. With so much on her mind and so little outlets, she took to her garden in the attempt to calm herself. This time however, she’d forgot to close the small gate that led to the outside world.

Kuro was, to say the very least, on edge. He was in a city of exorcists, and he didn’t have a single ally within the city’s walls. So, when he saw the open gate to a pleasant looking garden, he didn’t think twice. Unfortunately, by the time he noticed the girl in the garden, she’d also noticed him.

As a summoner, Shiemi had grown used to seeing demons on a daily basis, but it was still a shock to see a small cat sith wonder into her garden. She panicked momentarily before she realised that she recognised the demon from its previous service as the guard at the gates. Although she knew it was a soft attitude to have, especially for an exorcist, she didn’t agree with expelling all the demons in the city and couldn’t find it in herself to exorcise the demon nor chase it away.

“Hello there. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you,” she coaxed. Kuro edged forwards, still nervous, but not as much as before. “What are you doing in the city, little guy?”

“I’m waiting for Rin!” he announced even though whatever he said Shiemi’s ears would only interpret as a cat’s mewling. With her patient, kind words, it didn’t take long for her to persuade Kuro to get close enough to pet; he certainly didn’t have any complaints when she was rubbing his tummy. However, after only a short while he suddenly jumped up on alert. It didn’t take a genius to tell he’d sensed something.

“What is it?” Shiemi whispered, keeping her voice low. She was just about to investigate when a fluffy head popped around the corner. “Rin?”

“Shiemi?” Only a moment later Kuro had bounded up into Rin’s arms, snuggling into his chest.

“Rin! I was so worried! I thought you weren’t going to come back and…”

“Woah there, slow down, Kuro.”

“I’m glad to have to back, Rin!”

“Me too, buddy.” Rin looked back up to find Shiemi giving him quite the shocked look. “Guess we just keep running into each other.”

“A-ah, yes!” Shiemi stood up looking flustered, she quickly brushed the dirt off her knees before facing Rin again. “Is that your familiar?”

“Yeah, I guess that’s one word to call him… What are you doing here?”

“I live here, in that house,” Shiemi said pointing to the side of the garden, “we run an exorcist supply shop, so we grow a lot of the herbs in this garden...”

“…I should probably get going,” Rin said, eying the shop nervously, “thanks for looking after Kuro.”

“No problem!” Despite the happy smile Shiemi had attempted to pull, Rin could tell she was upset about something and, against every self-preservation instinct he had, he just had to ask.

“Something wrong?”

“Well, I’m just a little worried about my friend, Yukio.”

“Yukio Okumura?”

“Yes! Do you know him?”

“It’s a… Long story.”

“Do you know where he is?” Rin took a moment to consider whether he should tell the truth or not.

“He’s a little occupied right now… You see…” realising there was no polite way to phrase it, Rin just went in for brutal honesty. “He’s been possessed by Satan so he _may_ be in Gehenna right now being used as a vessel to invade Earth…” Shiemi went as pale as a ghost and Rin wondered absently if he’d care that much about his brother if he hadn’t been kidnapped.

“We have to tell the Vatican! We’ve got to…”

“See, that’s a bad idea,” Shiemi gave him a confused look, “the Vatican may, oh I don’t know, think I’ve killed him and _I_ am the one trying to invade Assiah. A long story… Yeah.”

“If Yuki is in trouble I can’t just sit around! I’m an exorcist, even if the Vatican doesn’t help I can still do something!”

“Against Satan?” Shiemi fell silent. “If you tried to fight it could mean your death.”

“If Satan was trying to invade Assiah then… Well then that would mean my death anyway. But how can I trust you?”

“It’s simple, do you know anyone called Mephistopheles?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the long wait! I've been in a h u g e writing slump but I've actually made plans for once so the next few chapters should be rolling out soon, and I actually mean it this time, it's not going to be like the other 700 times I've said that! Anyway, kudos and comments are appreciated and I'd like to thank everyone that's supported me so far; as always, thanks for reading!


	20. The Office

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I keep promising to post regularly but we both know at this point that it's not going to happen. what I can promise is that i'll finish this fic! It's been rough going lately and I know what i'm writing isn't that good but i'm letting enough people down already. Sorry it's only a short chapter, but I feel like you've all been waiting long enough.

Shiemi walked down the corridors of True Academy as casually as she could, in other words she was entirely conspicuous. She fiddled with her fingers and shook with a nervous energy as she struggled to contain herself on the way to the headmaster’s office. The instructions Rin had given her were clear. Go to the Mephisto’s office and tell him to meet Rin in the city park at midnight. Simple enough, but somehow she knew it wouldn’t be as straight forwards as she thought. Just as she was approaching the school courtyard, she heard the voices of her friends. Loud and brash, their voices alone lifted her heart and her spirits; even if she didn’t have the time to stay and talk, she was sure that just seeing them would give her the confidence and encouragement she needed to follow through with the plan.

As soon as she turned the corner, a pit of dread settled in her stomach. Yukio stood in the middle of the group, Bon, Izumo, Shima and Konekomaru gathered around him and they were talking excitedly. Rin had said he was possessed by Satan, but there he was. A million questions flashed through her mind. Was Rin lying? Was this actually Satan? Before she could even come up with a single answer, Yukio’s eyes turned to her.

“Shiemi!” he called, but his voice was… off. It didn’t sound like Yukio. “Come join us.” At his call, the others turned and their gaze found her too as they waved her over.

“Oh! Sorry everyone, I’ve got to go… I’ll come back in a- “

“Where you going, Shiemi?” Yukio interrupted. It was his voice, sure, but not his words.

“You guys don’t have to worry about it,” she laughed nervously, “it’ll only take a minute.” Yukio cocked his head as if appraising her. Every movement he made seemed like a tell, a sign that it wasn’t Yukio in front of them. Shiemi couldn’t understand why the others couldn’t see it. Couldn’t see the jerky movements or the cruel gleam in his normally kind eyes. Maybe it was her years of knowing Yukio, or maybe only Rin’s warning that made her see beyond the surface; but whatever knowledge it was that allowed her to see past the façade, it was that same knowledge that was screaming her to run.

“I’ve got to go, I’m sorry,” she tried, excusing herself, but Yukio’s arm shot out to clamped on her arm as she turned.

“Stay a little longer,” he invited, even though his voice was completely devoid of any emotion.

“I-I can’t,” she said, making a futile attempt to free her arm from Yukio’s, no, Satan’s grasp. She supressed a shiver as she watched the eerie, out of place expressions on Yukio’s face as he quickly scanned the other’s in the group, finally deciding on releasing her.

“Fine, fine…” he conceded, “don’t be too long.” Shiemi sped away as the others continued talking to him as if nothing was wrong.

As soon as the group was out of sight, Shiemi broke into a run and burst into the corridors of the main offices of the school. The noise she made as she rushed through the building attracted some attention as a few heads popped out of their offices to see the commotion but they were left largely ignored as she raced on towards Mephisto’s office. She almost slammed into the headmaster’s office before she remembered to stop and knock. A few seconds after rapping on the door as politely as she could manage, Mephisto’s muffled voice ushered her in.

“Ah, _Shiemi_! What can I do for you?” he asked, resting his arms on the table in a steeple in front of him.

“I… Well… I have a message for you from someone named Rin… he said you’d know him so- “

“From Rin, you say?” Shiemi nodded, “I see. Well, what’s the message?”

“He says… He says to meet him in the city park at midnight.” She sighed in relief as she was finally able to deliver her message.

“I’m sure that’ll hardly be necessary.”

“What?” Shiemi’s relief was short lived as Mephisto’s face split into a wide, lazy grin.

“Well, for one thing, he’s right outside my window,” he sighed dramatically, “and here he thought he could out outwit his older brother. Come on in, the window’s open.” To Shiemi’s surprise, Rin stepped through the window, grumbling all the time. She stood open mouthed as Mephisto chastised him, trying to figure out how exactly he got up there.

“You’re a thousand years too early to try and slip past me.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know i'd originally planned to post this on the 1st of april but it's so bad it's practically a joke all year round. thanks for sticking with me on this and i'll try to do my best. As always, thanks for reading!


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